Centre moves HC over IPS officer's repatriation

The Central government has moved the Bombay High Court challenging the decision of the Central Administrative Tribunal ( CAT) setting aside the repatriation of Sushowan Banerjee, Chief Executive Officer ( CEO) of Children's Film Society of India (CFSI). However, the division bench of Justice B H Marlapalle and Justice Amjad Sayed before whom the matter was mentioned on Monday declined to give an early date for the hearing.

A 1989- batch IPS, Banerjee was deputed as the CEO in December 2008 for three years and repatriated back to Madhya Pradesh by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting on April 26, 2010, as he was allegedly interfering with the work of its chairperson, actor Nandita Das.

On September 8, CAT struck down Banerjee's repatriation order, apart from making a veiled criticism of Das.

Banerjee's advocate Sandeep Marne argued that he Banerjee was repatriated by CFSI when he allegedly had a conflict of opinion with Das after which he moved CAT. As per CFSI constitution, Banerjee as the CEO was responsible for administrative functioning and the chairperson ( Das) was needed to give creative inputs.

CFSI had charged Banerjee with interference, but CAT observed that " no creative inputs appear to have been proposed by Das either". CAT further observed that Banerjee was removed only because he insisted that Das stick to the rules.