Jawansing vs The Scheduled Tribe Caste Certificate Scrutiny Committee, Amravati & Ors.

Heard.

Rule. Rule made returnable forthwith. Heard finally by consent of the learned counsels for the parties.

The claim of the petitioner that he belongs to ‘Naikada’ caste which comes under the category of Scheduled Tribes has been invalidated by respondent no. 1- Scheduled Tribe Caste Certificate Scrutiny Committee, Amravati (for short, “the Committee”) by order dated 17.01.2022 on the ground that contra-entries were found in the Vigilance enquiry which is under challenge in this petition.

The petitioner was appointed as ‘Assistant Teacher’ on a post reserved for the Scheduled Tribes category and therefore, a proposal for validation of the caste claim of the petitioner was referred to the Committee. The petitioner produced all the documents belonging to himself as well as his forefathers showing their caste as ‘Naikada’. The matter was referred to the Vigilance Cell for enquiry. During Vigilance Enquiry, the Vigilance Cell procured the birth extract of a male child namely Rabsingh born to Ambersingh on 04.12.1938 wherein, the caste is written as ‘Mathure- Banjari’. The other two documents are in the name of the father of the petitioner and the petitioner showing their caste as ‘Vanjari’ in the document of the year 1947 and the document dated 14.07.1981 respectively. Relying on these documents, the caste claim of the petitioner was invalidated by the Committee.

The contention of the petitioner is that, the name of the grandfather of the petitioner is Amarsingh and not Ambersingh. Even, the son named Rabsingh who is shown to be born to Ambersingh is not mentioned in the family tree. The learned AGP vehemently submitted that Amarsingh and Ambersingh is one and the same, since the name of the father of Ambersingh is written as Sarichand, who is the great grandfather of the petitioner and the name Amarsingh is seen in the family tree.

We have gone through the record. It appears that though, Amarsingh is shown as the grandfather of the petitioner but Rabsingh is not shown as the son of Amarsingh anywhere. Therefore, we find support in the argument of the learned counsel for the petitioner that Rabsingh and Ambersingh are not his relatives. Even otherwise, the oldest document i.e. birth extract of the father of the petitioner dated 09.02.1935 was produced before the Committee; however, the said document was discarded merely on the ground that the document is in torn condition and certified copy of such document cannot be given. The petitioner has produced certified copy of the said birth extract of his father obtained by him in the year 2008. There is nothing on record to suggest that though, the Vigilance Cell verified the said document in torn condition but did not find the caste of the petitioner as ‘Naikada’ in the said document.

In the decision of this Court in cases of Javedkha Musakhan Pathan Vs. Scrutiny Committee (Writ Petition No. 7419/2024, decided on 13.08.2025) and Ku. Gangubai D/O Prabhakar Naitam Vs. District Caste Certificate Scrutiny Committee, Chandrapur (Writ Petition No. 8381/2023, decided on 23.09.2024), it has been observed that just because the document is in torn condition and cannot be produced before the Committee, the Committee cannot out rightly reject the document only on the said ground. Having found the oldest document of the year 1935 i.e. birth extract of the father of the petitioner and other documents relating to the petitioner as well his forefathers showing consistent entries of their caste as Naikada, the Committee should not have invalidated the caste claim of the petitioner by ignoring the oldest document of the year 1935 just because few documents showed the caste of the petitioner and their relatives as ‘Banjari/Vanjari’. Needless to mention that, the oldest document has more probative value and therefore, we find that the findings recorded by the Committee do not stand to the reason. Hence, we pass the following order:-