The Assam Pradesh Congress Committee on Saturday evening decided to suspend sacked state education minister Ripun Borah from the primary membership of the party in the wake of his arrest by Central Bureau of Investigation on a bribery charge on June 3.

The APCC informed the media that sacked minister Borah was suspended from the party after the AICC gave the approval for it. The AICC former minister was a member of the party's national level committee.

Tainted Borah had been suspended for an unspecified period until further order by the Congress, apparently to disarm the opposition parties that are baying for Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi's head over the arrest of the former education minister on a bribery charge.

Earlier, Gogoi had sacked Borah from the Assam council of ministers, hours after his arrest in response to a directive from Congress high command.

The arrested former minister commented before the media in New Delhi that he had become the victim of a conspiracy hatched by his opponents within the party.

The CBI arrested Borah on the charge of offering a bribe to one of its officials to influence the probe into the murder of Assam tea tribe student leader Daniel Topno.

The CBI alleged that Borah, in his bid to wriggle out of the probe against him, tried to bribe Deputy Superintendent of Police, CBI, A B Gupta, who was probing whether Borah had any role in the murder that took place on September 27, 2000.

Meanwhile, Congress workers on Saturday took out a procession on streets of Guwahati expressing solidarity with the chief minister and his council of ministers to counter the opposition parties' demand for dismissal of the Congress-led coalition government after the arrest of one of its senior ministers by the CBI on a bribery charge.