Yogita d/o Nitin Thakur v. The State of Maharashtra & another
Case Details
- 1 - cp293.22.odt IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE OF BOMBAY BENCH AT AURANGABAD CONTEMPT PETITION NO. 293 OF 2022 IN WRIT PETITION NO. 1458 OF 2022 Yogita d/o Nitin Thakur Petitioner Versus The State of Maharashtra & another Respondents Mr. S.C. Yeramwar, Advocate for the petitioner. Mr. S. P. Tiwari, AGP for respondent/State. WITH CONTEMPT PETITION NO. 295 OF 2022 IN WRIT PETITION NO. 1459 of 2022 Janhavi d/o Shashank Bhamare Petitioner Versus The State of Maharashtra & another Respondents
Legal Reasoning
Mr. S.C. Yeramwar, Advocate for the petitioner. Mr. S. P. Tiwari, AGP for respondent/State. CORAM : RAVINDRA V. GHUGE & ANIL L. PANSARE, JJ. DATE : 16th JUNE, 2022. PER COURT : 1. These two petitioners are frst blood cousins. Both had approached this Court in Writ Petitions No. 1458/2022 and - 2 - cp293.22.odt 1459/2022, respectively. On 1st February, 2022, both the petitions
Decision
were disposed off by recording that the reply to the Vigilance Report has already been tendered much earlier to the passing of the order and hence this Court granted two months’ time to the Committee to decide the pending claims. 2. Today, both the petitioners intend to seek admission to the Engineering and Medical Course. There are twenty four validity certifcate holders amongst the four branches of blood relatives to which these petitioners belong. Seventeen members have been granted validity certifcates by the Committee and seven blood relatives have been granted validity certifcates by this Court. 3. The learned Advocate for the petitioners places before us an order dated 18th December, 2021, passed by this Court (Coram : S. V. Gangapurwala & S. G. Dige, JJ) in Writ Petition No. 13569/2021 fled by Shreyas S/o Mahendra Thakur, a blood related cousin brother of both the present petitioners. This Court, noticing the large number of validity certifcates issued to the blood relatives, passed an order that the Committee shall proceed to issue validity certifcate without any further enquiry. It would be apposite to reproduce - 3 - cp293.22.odt pragraphs No. 8 to 15 from the order dated 8th December, 2021, as under :- 8) We have considered the submissions made by the learned counsel for the parties. In the present case, there is no dispute that certifcate of caste validity is issued in favour of real brother and 18 close relatives of the petitioner. Out of these caste certifcates, fve caste validity certifcates have been granted under the orders of this Court and remaining caste validities are given by the Caste Scrutiny Committee by following due procedure. The petitioner is taking education in respondent No. 4’s College under category of scheduled Tribe and he requires validity certifcate for his education purpose. The proposal of his caste validity is pending before respondent No. 2 Scrutiny Committee since January, 2021. The petitioner has given an application to the respondent No. 2 – Scrutiny Committee to decide his caste validity certifcate expeditiously but till date it has not been decided. If the validity of caste certifcate of petitioner is not given within time, the education career of the petitioner would come in peril. 9) The caste claim of the real brother of the petitioner namely Amey Thakur was invalidated by the Scrutiny Committee. Therefore, the real brother of the petitioner had preferred Writ Petition No. 9322 - 4 - cp293.22.odt of 2018 before this Court at Principal Seat and the Division Bench at Principal Seat under order dated 21st October, 2021 has allowed the said Writ Petition and directed the Scrutiny Committee to issue caste validity certifcate in favour of the petitioner therein as “Thakur” Scheduled Tribe. While allowing said Writ Petition, the Division bench of this Court at Principal Seat has considered all relevant aspects of the matter so also all the documents and the judgments of the Hon’ble Supreme Court as well as this Court. 10) The Division Bench of this Court in the case of Neeta Divan Bhamre (supra) has held that petitioner’s real brother is already granted caste validity certifcate as belonging to ‘Thakur – Scheduled Tribe.’ Hence that petition was allowed. 11) The Division Bench of this Court in Writ Petition No.11656 of 2019 in the case of Jayashri Kautikrao Suryawanshi vide order dated 24th September, 2019 (supra) granted caste validity of Thakur Scheduled Tribe to petitioner therein as caste validity was granted to his real brother. 12) The Division Bench of this Court in Writ Petition No. 10239 of 2019 in the case of Abhieet Viaykumar Suryawnshi (supra) granted the caste - 5 - cp293.22.odt validity certifcate to petitioner therein as caste validity certifcate was issued to petitioner’s father. In the said Writ Petition, the petitioner’s validity claim was pending with the Caste Scrutiny Committee. The facts of the said case are identical to the case of the present petition. 13) In the present case, petitioner’s caste claim is pending with respondent No. 2 – Scrutiny Committee since 11 months. Various applications were given to respondent No. 2 – Scrutiny Committee to decide caste claim expeditiously, inspite of that no action is taken by respondent No. 2. The petitioner requires caste validity certifcate for his education purpose. We are of the view that, respondent No. 2- Committee ought to have taken steps to decide caste claim of the petitioner in 11 months. Respondent No. 2 – Committee can not sit over the decision as the Appellate Authority and can not over look the caste validity certifcates given to petitioner’s real brother under the orders of this Court and his 18 close blood relatives. The validities of said certifcates are given by following due and proper procedure. This Court in the case of Apoorva Nichale (supra) has held that when the caste claim of the applicant has been scrutinized and accepted by Scrutiny Committee validating his caste claim, it should be accepted by other Caste Scrutiny Committee while dealing with - 6 - cp293.22.odt the caste claim of applicant’s another blood relatives. In this context, the following paragraph of Apoorva Nichale (supra) are quoted as under : “4. We have considered the matter and we are of the view that the petitioner’s caste claim that she belongs to Kanjar Bhat – Nomadic Tribe ought to have been accepted by the Committee merely on the basis that identical caste claim of her sister that she belongs to Kanjar bhat has been allowed by the Committee, even apart from the Government Resolution. We are of the opinion that the guidelines provided by the said Govt. Resolution are sound and based on sound principles. It would indeed be chaotic otherwise. If the relationship by blood is established or not doubted and one such relative has been confrmed as belonging to a particular caste, there is no reason why public time or money should be spent in the committee testing the same evidence and making the same conclusion unless of course the Committee fnds on the evidence that the validity of the certifcate of such relation has been obtained by fraud. 14) In normal course, we would not have entertained this petition, but considering the urgency and exigency in this matter and if relief is not granted immediately the education career of the petitioner would be in peril. While granting caste validity - 7 - cp293.22.odt certifcate to the real brother of the petitioner, namely, Amey Thakur, the Division Bench of this Court at Principal set has dealt with all issues raised by learned AGP and set aside the order passed by the Scrutiny Committee invalidating the caste claim of Amey Thakur and directed the Scrutiny Committee to issue caste certifcate of Thakur – Scheduled Tribe to Amey Thakur. The said judgment is not reviewed. 15) In the light of above, taking overall view of the matter and for the above recorded reasons, the petition is required to be allowed. We make it clear that the decision passed in this petition would not be set as precedent. 4. The learned Advocate representing the Committee, on specifc instructions received from Mr. Dinesh B. Tidake, Member Secretary, submits that the orders in both these matters would be passed by the Committee on or before 30th July, 2022 without seeking an extension of even a single day. It is further submitted that if there is any delay in receiving the Vigilance Committee report, the Committee, relying upon the order passed by this Court in the case of Shreyas (supra), would proceed to pass a fnal order without even waiting for the report. - 8 - cp293.22.odt 5. The learned Advocate for the petitioners submits in the light of the above submissions that these contempt petitions may be disposed off as the petitioners are not interested in the punishment being meted out to the Committee members. 6. As such, having recorded the submissions made as above, both these petitions are disposed off. We make it clear that if this order is violated, it would be treated as an aggravated contempt and this Court would then deal with the Committee members in the strictest possible manner. 7. These two petitioners would appear before the Committee on Monday, 20th June, 2022, at 3.00 pm. ( ANIL L. PANSARE ) Judge ( RAVINDRA V. GHUGE ) Judge dyb