NEW DELHI, April 30: Another Indian minister offered to resign on Tuesday after his party decided to abstain from voting on a parliamentary motion against the government over its handling of anti-Muslim violence in Gujarat.

Junior Foreign Minister Omar Abdullah, together with other members of the National Conference (NC) party, met Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee before the start of debate in the Lok Sabha.

“We told him that our decision still stands, we will abstain and my resignation offer still stands,” Omar said, adding that it was now up to the prime minister to make a decision.

“We don’t think we are in position to be with the government and defend the government, so it is necessary for us to abstain and for me to tender my resignation,” Omar said.

Abdullah, whose father is the chief minister of occupied Kashmir, is one of the rising young stars on the Indian political scene.

The National Conference, which has five MPs in the federal parliament and is a member of the ruling coalition, decided on Tuesday morning to abstain from the parliamentary vote.

The opposition-sponsored motion seeks to censure the BJP-led government for its handling of the violence in Gujarat.—AFP