MUMBAI, November 18: The embarrassed Shiv Sena-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Government today unconditionally withdrew the controversial circular according to which officials were restrained from interacting with the members of the fourth estate.

``I am of the opinion that such a circular should not have been issued since collecting information is the right of the journalists. However, now I am directing the administration to withdraw the circular with immediate effect,'' Chief Minister Manohar Joshi said.

In fact, after The Indian Express published the contents of the circular on November 13, not only senior bureaucrats, but also Cabinet Ministers had expressed surprise over the directives given by Chief Secretary P Subramanian to his subordinates.

``We learn from criticism. If the media paints rosy picture of the Government, then we will not know the state of affairs at the grass-roots level. Under such circumstances, it was improper to promulgate such an undemocratic order,'' a senior BJP Minister said.

The Minister said it was most unfortunate that the administration had to warn its employees against releasing confidential information. ``Such circulars will not help to curb the criticism against the Government. The need of the hour is to improve our performance instead of concentrating on populist schemes,'' the Minister added.

The circular envisaged disciplinary action under the provisions of the Maharashtra Civil Service (Discipline) Rules and All India Civil Service (Discipline) Rules against the erring employees.

As per the order, under Section 8 of the Maharashtra Civil Service (Discipline) Rules 1979 and under Section 9 of the All India Civil Service (Discipline) Rules 1968, the officials as well as employees are restrained from releasing unauthorised information to the media.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.