Censor Board row: Congress calls Jaitley's statement unfortunate, regrettable

Congress leader Manish Tewari on Saturday said that Union Information and Broadcasting Minister Arun Jaitley's accusations on his party over politicising the Censor Board was unfortunate and regrettable.

"It is unfortunate and regrettable. If the finance minister believed that the board was politicized by the UPA, they should have sacked it right away. Why wait for eight months? The government is trying to make it a UPA and NDA issue. If there was any corruption, it should have been pointed out immediately," said Tewari.

Meanwhile, senior party leader P C Chacko the incident of censor board members collectively giving resignations has never happened in the country.

"Arun Jaitley is a knowledable person. After being in the government for over seven months, if he does not know the members of the censor board, than my sympathies are with him. They are trying to evade the primary question. That the censor board is collectively giving resignation has never happened in India," said Chacko.

Earlier in the day, Jaitley dismissed allegations of interference and corruption by former Censor Board members, calling them "rebels without a case" in one of his articles.

He further accused the Congress of politicising the censor board.

Censor Board chief Leela Samson stepped down from her post earlier on Friday, amid controversy surrounding the clearance of controversial film "Messenger of God" featuring Dera Saccha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh and citing interference, coercion and corruption of panel members.

Nine other board members resigned following her resignation.