Bombay High Court

Arbav S/O. Vipin Kedare And Others vs Vice-Chairman And Jt. Commissioner, S. ... on 25 October, 2024

Author: M.S. Jawalkar

Bench: Avinash G. Gharote, M.S. Jawalkar

2024:BHC-NAG:12208-DB


                 Judgment                                          1




                      IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY,
                                NAGPUR BENCH, NAGPUR.


                                      WRIT PETITION NO. 8048 OF 2023


                 1.      Arnav S/o Vipin Kedare,
                         Aged 19 years, Occupation : Student,
                         R/o. E-19, Konark Campus, Viman
                         Nagar, Pune-411014

                 2.      Aryan S/o Vipin Kedare
                         Aged 22 years, Occupation : Student,
                         R/o. E-19, Konark Campus, Viman
                         Nagar, Pune-411014

                 3.      Piyush S/o Milind Kedare
                         Aged 28 years, Occupation :
                         Student/Private Job, R/o. Flat No. 16,
                         Shivganga Enclave, Gokul Housing
                         Society, Gorewada Road, Nagpur -
                         440013

                                                                                       .... PETITIONERS
                                                        // VERSUS //

                 1.      Vice-Chairman and Joint
                         Commissioner, Scheduled Tribe Caste
                         Certificate Scrutiny Committee,
                         Amravati

                 2.      Sub-Divisional Officer, Tah.
                         Achalpur, District - Amravati

                                                                                    .... RESPONDENTS
                 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                 Shri C.S. Dhore, Advocate for petitioners
                 Shri A.G. Mate, AGP for respondents
                 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Judgment                                 2




CORAM :       AVINASH G. GHAROTE AND
              SMT. M.S. JAWALKAR, JJ.

DATE OF RESERVING THE JUDGMENT: 20/09/2024
DATE OF PRONOUNCING THE JUDGMENT : 25/10/2024


JUDGMENT (PER: SMT. M.S. JAWALKAR, J.)

(1) Rule. Rule made returnable forthwith.

(2) Heard finally by consent of learned counsel appearing for

the parties at the stage of admission.

(3) Petitioners are challenging the order dated 16/06/2023

passed by the respondent No.1, Scheduled Tribe Caste Certificate

Scrutiny Committee, Amravati, thereby invalidating the tribe claim of

the petitioners to be belonging to 'Halbi' Scheduled Tribe.

(4) All the petitioners are brothers. Petitioner Nos. 1 and 2

are real brothers and petitioner No.3 is the cousin of petitioner Nos. 1

and 2. Petitioner No.1 is student of Hotel management and Catering

Technology, petitioner No.2 is graduated in Science and is aspiring for

Post Graduation in Management and is aspiring for Government job.

The petitioner moved application for issuance of Caste Certificate of

'Halbi' Scheduled Tribe with all necessary documents as per Section 3

of the Act before Respondent No.2, Sub Divisional Officer which is

Competent Authority under the Act. The proposal on behalf of

petitioner No.1, Principal, Shri Hanumantrao Chate School and Junior

Science College, Shahupuri, Kolhapur forwarded the proposal of

petitioner No.2 and petitioner No.3 himself forwarded the proposal for

validity to respondent No.1 for verification of Scheduled Tribe

certificate along with original Scheduled Tribe Certificates and all

required documents of their ancestors.

(5) It is submitted that there are several other documents such

as sale deeds of the year 1947 and 1954 which tends to show that the

ancestors of the petitioners belong to 'Halbi' Scheduled Tribe. On

30/11/2022, the Police Vigilance Cell submitted its report inter alia

pointing out that Late Dasraji is great great grandfather of the

petitioners and his date of death was 07/01/1920 mentioning his caste

as 'Koshti' and the date of birth of male child born to great grandfather

of the petitioners Baliram is found to be 19/12/2021 mentioning his

caste as 'Koshti'. It is further submitted that the Vigilance Cell has

grossly erred in holding that the aforesaid two persons are relatives of

the petitioners. It is submitted that the Scrutiny Committee, Nagpur

has issued validity in favour of the paternal cousin of petitioners Mr.

Ajay Suresh Kedare on 28/02/1996 showing that said cousin belongs

to Halba Koshti caste and the same has attained finality as the same is

not reversed till date. Despite availability of documents depicting that

the petitioners belong to 'Halbi' Scheduled Tribe, vide impugned order,

the respondent No.1 Committee rejected the tribe claim of the

petitioners.

(6) The petitioners has produced following pre-independance

documents produced before the Scrutiny Committee :-

Sr.No.        Type of          Name          Caste     Date      Relation
             document                                              with
                                                                 petitioner
1        Leaving            Arvind Baliram Halbi     30/06/1948 Grandfather
         Certificate   and Kedare                               of Applicant
         Dakhal      Kharij                                     Nos. 1,2 and

2        Extract of Kharedi Prabhakar Bhau Halbi     15/12/1947 Cousin
         Khat               Arvind     S/o                      Grandfather
                            Baliramji                           of Applicant
                            Kedare                              Nos. 1,2 and

3        Validity          Vipin Arvind Halbi        28/02/1989 Father    of
         Certificate       Kedare                               Applicant
                                                                Nos. 1,2 and
                                                                uncle     of
                                                                applicant




(7)              The genealogy produced by the petitioner before the





Scrutiny Committee is as under -



                                  Genealogy Tree
                                    Dashrathji

                                        Baliramji


       Prabhakar                          Arvind           Suresh                 Tulshibai
                                                                                  Husband
                                                                     Shamraoji Shinde Achalpur


Dilip Vijay Niteshwar Sanjay Prakash


Minakshi Sunanda Vipin        Milind     Varsha     Ajay      Amit          Vaishali




 1) Aryan          2) Arnav   3 ) Piyush (Applicants)




(8)             Learned counsel for the petitioner contended that the

petitioner belongs to 'Halbi' community which is substantiated on the

basis of a Sale Deed dated 15/12/1947 by the cousin grandfather of

the petitioners. School leaving certificate and Dakhal Kharij entry of

the grandfather of the petitioners dated 30/06/1948, validity in favour

of father of petitioner Nos. 1 and 2 and uncle of petitioner No.3 dated

28/02/1989 and several other documents which mentions petitioners

caste as 'Halbi'.

(9) Learned counsel for the petitioner further contended that

the respondent Scrutiny Committee erred in holding that despite Halbi

being mentioned in the relevant documents which are of pre

independence era of the ancestors of the petitioners, the same has not

been accepted merely because at the relevant time 'Halba' and 'Halbi'

were mentioned as sub-castes of the caste 'Koshti'. It is not for the

respondent Scrutiny Committee to replace the import of entries in the

record with its own misplaced opinion without any substantial

evidence such finding of the Committee is already overruled in Priya

Parate's case by this Hon'ble Court, therefore prayed for the

interference by this court.

(10) Learned Assistant Government Pleader for the

respondent- Scrutiny Committee has supported the judgment

passed by the Scrutiny Committee and stated that there are other

documents with other caste entries therefore the order passed by

the Scrutiny Committee is appropriate which needs no

interference by this Court and prayed for dismissal of the petition.

(11) Heard both the parties at length. Perused record of

respondent Scrutiny Committee which was produced by learned

Assistant Government Pleader on record. The entries which were

relied by the Scrutiny Committee for rejecting the claim of the

petitioner are following two entries :

v-dz dkxni=kps Lo:i dkxni=kojh Tkekr fnukad vtZnknk'kh y O;Drhps ukrs uko 1 e`R;w uksan nljkth dks"Vh 7.1.1920 vtZnkj dz-

                      jk-lqyrkuiqjk                      1]2 o 3 ps
                                                         [kkij
                                                         i.ktksck
2      Tue uksan        cGhjke ;kauk dks"Vh   19.12.1921 vtZnkj dz-
                        ,d eqyck                         1]2 o 3 ps
                        >kY;kph uksan                    vktksck
                        jk- lejliwjk




(12)         On the basis of these entries, the Scrutiny Committee

arrived at a conclusion that there are different entries of

forefathers of petitioners. In our considered opinion, these entries

cannot be relied on by the respondent Committee as there are no

further details of the said persons. Even their place of residents

are also different. Admittedly, the documents produced by the

petitioners are documents pertaining to pre-independence period

and there are details of person i.e. Prabhakarbhau Arvind S/o

Baliramji Kedare, his tribe is shown as 'Halbi'. The said sale deed

is dated 15/12/1947. Another document i.e. school leaving

certificate of Arvind Baliram Kedare, whose date of birth is shown

as July, 1941 and admission of Arvind Baliram Kedare in the

school is shown as 30/06/1948. He was shown as belonging to

'Halbi' tribe. It is surprising that Caste Scrutiny Committee, in

spite of two documents on record showing caste of the petitioner's

forefather as 'Halbi' were not considered these documents and the

documents having no further details connecting those persons to

the petitioners was considered to reject the claim of the

petitioners. The petitioner placed on record certificate issued in

favour of Arvind Baliram Kedare (page 120) dated 03/06/1978,

wherein his tribe is shown as 'Halbi'. He has also produced

Scheduled Tribe certificate issued in favour of Vipin Arvind Kedare

(page 123).

(13) The petitioner also produced on record judgment of

this Court in Writ Petition No. 1587/1985, wherein, Milind Arvind

Kedare was declared as belonging to 'Halba Koshti' and in view of

Writ Petition No. 2944/1984 decided on 4/5/6/1985, the

petitioner is declared to be belonging to 'Halba' tribe. Petitioner

also placed on record the certificate issued in favour of Ajay

Suresh Kedare. The said provisional validity was issued in view of

the order passed by Hon'ble Apex Court and directed to allow said

Ajay to admit to the seat reserved for Scheduled Tribe. There is no

dispute over genealogy, however, petitioner strongly objected the

report of Police Vigilance Cell as the entries collected are of

Achalpur, nor there was any details of the said persons about their

fathers name or surname. It is common knowledge that there are

many people having the similar name, however, to co-relate these

persons to the petitioners, further details are required. When

Committee is alleging that these two persons are in relation with

the petitioner and their caste entries are shown as 'Koshti' that has

to be established with material evidence. Similarity in the name

may not be of any assistance to the Caste Scrutiny Committee.

Another ground for rejection of the claim is affinity test. However,

in view of the judgment of Anand vs. Committee for Scrutiny

and Verification of Tribe Claim and others, 2011(6) Mh.L.J.

919, and Maharashtra Adiwasi Thakur Jamat Swarakshan

Samiti vs. State of Maharashtra and others, 2023(2) Mh.L.J

785, affinity test cannot be applied as a litmus test while

determining the claim of the candidate. This Court in Sou. Priya

w/o Pravin Parate Vs. Scheduled Tribes Caste Certificates Scrutiny

Committee, Amravati and others, in Writ Petition No.

2571/2001, observed that :

"10.......

....... From the aforesaid authority, it would reveal that persons belonging to Halba Tribe had migrated to west and taken service under the Gond Kings of Chanda. It can also be seen that some of them had taken to weaving and had amalgamated with the Koshti caste in Bhandara and Berar. Merely because some stray entries as "Koshti" are recorded in respect of caste of some of the relative of petitioners from their paternal side; the voluminous documentary evidence of pre-Constitution era which clearly certify the · petitioners great-grand father and his brothers to be Halbi, could not have been lightly brushed aside by the Scrutiny Committee. As discussed herein above, the Hon'ble Apex Court in case of Anand (supra), found that the pre-independence documents have a greater probative value and they should be given due consideration while considering the claim of a tribal"

(14) In that view of the matter, we find that the Committee

has grossly erred in rejecting the tribe claim of the petitioner.

There are documentary evidence of pre constitution era in respect

of great grandfather, cousin grandfather in school record and

revenue records, the caste is recorded as 'Halbi'. It is not the case

of the Scrutiny Committee that these documents are fraudulent or

fabricated one. Thus, these documents have greater probative

value. As such, claim of the petitioner could not have been

rejected. Accordingly, we pass the following order :