Voice Of Post

Censors exit, govt slams ‘rebels without a cause’, The row between the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) and the Information & Broadcasting Ministry — triggered by CBFC chairperson Leela Samson’s resignation alleging interference, coercion and corruption of panel members and officials appointed by the ministry — escalated on Saturday. As nine board members put in their papers, calling the government’s attitude “cavalier and dismissive”, Union Information & Broadcasting Minister Arun Jaitley said they were “rebels without a cause” and called Samson a “non-functional chairperson”.

“It is our firm position that given the cavalier and dismissive manner in which the CBFC is treated by the government, it is impossible to perform this duty with even a modicum of efficacy or autonomy,” says the joint resignation letter sent to Minister of State, I&B, Rajyavardhan Rathore. The nine board members who resigned today are Ira Bhaskar, Lora Prabhu, Mamang Dai, Pankaj Sharma, Rajeev Masand, Sekharbabu Kancherla, Shaji Karun, Shubhra Gupta and T G Thyagarajan.

The letter states that the “advisory panel continues to be filled up with people of questionable credentials appointed directly by the ministry, without taking the board’s recommendations into account”. Pointing out that no funds have been released for conducting orientation workshops for the panel members, it says “officers from other departments, who have no understanding or experience in cinema are appointed as officials”.

“Furthermore, there are several positions in the regional offices that do not have regular appointments There has been no board meeting for the last one year for us to discuss developments and make recommendations, as we were told that there are no funds to organise it. It seems that the CBFC Board is not required at all,” says the letter.
Hitting back at the board members, Jaitley, in a blog post, said it was “regrettable that the UPA appointees have decided to politicise routine issues”. He said at no point had he or Rathore “communicated with any member of the Censor Board or desired that any bureaucrat do the same”.

“It is the UPA-appointed Censor Board which has since continued. If there is any corruption, the UPA appointees have themselves to blame. I only wished that the fact of corruption had been communicated even once by the chairperson of the Censor Board to me. The non-functional chairperson never did so,” he said.

“The meetings are to be convened not by the minister or the secretary but by the chairperson. If the meetings are not being convened, it is those responsible for non-functioning who must blame themselves,” said Jaitley. “I have checked from officials of the ministry who informed that the funds for the Censor Board have been returned to the ministry as unspent by the board,” he said.

Stating that the “legal regime with regard to the functioning of the Censor Board is clear”, he said “it is the Censor Board alone which decides issues within its jurisdiction”.