Former external affairs minister Natwar Singh was removed from the Congress Steering Committee late Sunday night after a meeting of the core group of the Congress party under the chairmanship of party president Sonia Gandhi [Images].

• Volcker Report

Sonia had returned to New Delhi in the evening after visiting Amethi where she had gone along with her son Rahul and daughter Priyanka to lay the foundation stone of the Mrs Indira Gandhi [Images] hospital.

The decision to remove Natwar Singh from the core group was announced by Ambika Soni, general secretary of the party. The move would not built pressure on him to resign from the Union Council of Ministers.

According to insiders, his son Jagat Singh's statement that there was a conspiracy against his father had gone against Natwar as it had annoyed senior party leaders. Natwar's defiance not to resign and allow himself to be made scarificial goat added fuel to the fire.

But what went against him the most was that during his questioning, former Indian Ambassador to Croatia Aneil Mathrani had confirmed the statements that he made to India Today. Though Mathrani was annoyed with the media for tapping an off record conversation without his permission, in his questioning he did not dispute the contents of the interview. "This cooked Natwar's goose," said a senior intelligence official.