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‘UPA appointees are turning resignations into political issues’

“The NDA government maintains arm’s length distance in all matters relating to film certification... It is regrettable that the UPA appointees have decided to politicise routine issues,” he said in an article titled ‘Rebels Without a Cause’, which he posted on Facebook, referring to the fact that the members of the Censor Board were appointed during the previous Congress-led government.

Jaitley’s remarks came after nine members, in a joint letter of resignation, accused the government of treating the Board — a statutory body which falls under the Information and Broadcasting ministry — in a “cavalier and dismissive manner”.

“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,” the members said.

The events that led to Board Chairperson Leela Samson resigning from her position were merely the “proverbial last straw”, they added.

Samson had resigned as the head of the Censor Board amid a major row over the clearance granted to controversial film “MSG — The Messenger of God”, starring Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, the chief of the religious sect Dera Sacha Sauda. “I have not met or spoken to any Member of the Censor Board nor authorised anyone to do the same,” he said.

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