SHRAVANI Vs. SCHEDULED TRIBE CASTE CERTIFICATE SCRUTINY COMMITTEE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Rule. Rule made returnable forthwith and heard the learned Counsel for the parties.

(2.) The challenge raised in the Writ Petition is to the order passed by the Scrutiny Committee dtd. 6/9/2022 invalidating the petitioner's claim of belonging to 'Thakur' Scheduled Tribe. In support of her claim, the petitioner relied upon various pre-constitutional documents of her forefathers including the School Entry Register of her grandfather - Narayan indicating his date of birth as 27/8/1929 and having taken admission in School on 4/8/1938. The said document has the entry 'Thakur' in the caste column. The School Leaving Certificate of the petitioner's grandfather indicating the said dates was also relied upon. The petitioner also relied upon the birth extract register of her paternal grandmother - Shanti which indicated that her date of birth was 7/5/1938 with the entry 'Thakur'. The Scrutiny Committee in the impugned order has on the basis of the report of the Vigilance Cell recorded a finding that in the birth extract dtd. 21/5/1927 indicating a son being born to Narayan - petitioner's grandfather, the caste recorded was 'Bhat'. According to the Scrutiny Committee, the family tree was prepared on the basis of information supplied by the petitioner's father and as it was indicated therein that Narayan had two sons, the said entry dtd. 21/5/1927 was from her family itself. On that premise coupled with absence of affinity, the Scrutiny Committee proceeded to invalidate the petitioner's tribe claim.

(3.) The learned Counsel for the petitioner submitted that various pre-constitutional documents including the document of the year 1938 indicated consistent entries of 'Thakur'. On the basis of entry dtd. 21/5/1927 which was of a person not from the family of the petitioner, her claim has been rejected. In the reply filed to the report of the Vigilance Cell, a specific stand was taken that the document dtd. 21/5/1927 was of a person not related to the petitioner. Despite the aforesaid, the Scrutiny Committee invalidated the claim only on the ground that the petitioner's father had indicated that Narayan had two sons and one daughter and by inference that the said document was of Narayan's first son. As regards the aspect of affinity, it was submitted that the same could not be treated as a litmus test in the light of the judgment of the Larger Bench of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Maharashtra Adiwasi Thakur Jamat Swarakshan Samiti Vs. State of Maharashtra and others [2023(2) Mh.L.J. 785]. It was thus submitted that the claim as made ought to be accepted and the order passed by the Scrutiny Committee was liable to be set aside.