New Delhi, Sept. 14: Census commissioner Jayant Kumar Banthia is on his way out.

But his imminent exit from the home ministry apparently has nothing to do with his controversial analysis of growth rates of religious communities.

The reason is a mundane civil services rule that requires Indian Administrative Service officers to return to their parent cadre after a five-year deputation at the Centre.

Appointed the country?s census commissioner and registrar-general soon after he came to the Centre five years ago, Banthia was already continuing in the home ministry on borrowed time.

The 1977-batch Maharashtra cadre IAS officer?s five-year term ended in July this year but was extended for three months till October 4.

Officials said the Centre had decided against another extension and was looking for someone to step into Banthia?s shoes when he returns to Maharashtra next month.

The decision to return him to the state apparently has nothing to do with the government?s unhappiness at the way the Census Commission arrived at inflated figures of politically sensitive statistics on the growth of religious communities.

?This decision was taken much before the census figures on religion were released,? an official in the department of personnel and training said.

But as Banthia begins to pack his bags, there is the realisation he would be leaving on a sour note. The home ministry has been displeased ever since the census commissioner put out 36 per cent growth rate for Muslims, a figure that was far from reality as events over the last week made clear.

Banthia has since revised the Muslim growth rate to 29.3 per cent after excluding data from Assam and Jammu and Kashmir, which did not figure in the census in 1981 and 1991 respectively.

But questions are still being asked how the commission ? an organisation specialising in counting the country?s billion-plus population ? could arrive at the growth rate over two decades using data that was beyond comparison.

What makes it worse for Banthia is that home minister Shivraj Patil is one of those asking the question. The minister had last week summoned Banthia to hear his side of the story but was not impressed. Patil has spoken of a probe to ascertain why the initial set of figures was released.