During a ten-minute meeting at the Prime Minister's residence this afternoon, Dayanidhi Maran handed in his resignation as Union Textile Minister after the CBI said it has evidence against him in the telecom scam.  Sources in Chennai say that his exit from the Cabinet had been sanctioned by Mr Maran's grand-uncle, M Karunanidhi, who heads the DMK.

Mr Maran is scheduled to fly to Chennai this evening.  Sources say it's likely that Mr Karunanidhi has selected TR Baalu to replace him in the Cabinet.

Sources said Mr Maran's resignation came after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh held high-level meetings today with senior ministers Pranab Mukherjee, P Chidambaram, Veerappa Moily, Kapil Sibal and the Attorney General Ghulam Vahanvati separately. They discussed legal aspects of the case in view of the CBI's status report in court yesterday - Mr Chidambaram and Mr Sibal are also top lawyers of the country and Mr Moily is the Law Minister. 

The PM was, in fact, part of several huddled meetings on the issue since yesterday. He met with Congress president Sonia Gandhi last evening, and till late last night thereafter, sources said, backroom channels worked overtime between the Congress and the DMK, as it became increasingly clear that Mr Maran's staying on was untenable. The BJP and Karunanidhi's bête noir and Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, J Jayalalithaa, had made strong statements yesterday demanding that he be sacked.