``We faced severe mental strain apart from being humiliated practically every day,'' said Harihar. He has served as city engineer and was due to retire in a few months. ``The civic officials are duty-bound to follow the commissioner's orders and we did just that,'' he insisted.

In fact, we had no problem providing information about cases and developmental work in the past. What we asked for was sufficient time as the deadlines were strenuous, Harihar admitted.

Twenty-seven top civic officials had gone on a month and a half's leave to protest against the alleged ``insulting'' treatment meted out to Harihar and V M Kharwadkar. Officials maintained that the insults were the last straw while Harihar also pointed out how Bhatiaused to drive them up the wall by directing them to `dig out old cases'.

``That was just not possible for us,'' he said, insisting that the officers worked hard but faced severe mental strain due to his demands. Harihar said the officials preferred to wait and watch the further developments before deciding to challenge the suspension.