UMESH BUDHAJI THAKARversusSTATE OF MAHARASHTRA THROUGH ITS SECRETARY, TRIBAL DEVELOPMENT DEPT. AND ORS.

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            IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY
                    CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION
                   WRIT PETITION NO. 6610 OF 2015

Umesh Budhaji Thakar                                           ..Petitioner
      Vs.
State of Maharashtra & Ors                                     ..Respondents


Mr. R. K. Mendadkar a/w Ms P. A. Shaw and Mr. T. V. Jadhav for the
Petitioner
Mrs. R. M. Shinde AGP for the Respondent State

                                      CORAM :R. M. SAVANT, &
                                             NITIN W. SAMBRE, JJ
                                      DATE : 9th OCTOBER, 2018

P.C.

1           The Writ Jurisdiction of this Court is invoked against the order

dated 23­3­2015 passed by the Scheduled Tribe Certificate Scrutiny

Committee (for short STCS Committee), by which order the Petitioner's claim

as belonging to Thakar Schedule Tribe came to be rejected.



2           The Petitioner was granted a caste certificate as belonging to

Thakar Scheduled Tribe on 26­4­2002.          On the basis of the said caste

certificate the Petitioner came to be appointed in the Respondent No.3 in a

post reserved for the Scheduled Tribe.         In terms of the procedure the

Petitioner's caste certificate was forwarded to the Respondent No.2 committee

for seeking validity in view of the fact that the Petitioner was appointed in the

post meant for Scheduled Tribe. Before the STCS Committee the Petitioner


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relied upon a number of documents amongst which was the school leaving

certificate in respect of the Petitioner's uncle one Ganpat Mahadev Thakur

wherein in the column of caste it is mentioned as Hindu­Thakur and the date

of admission in school is shown as 27­10­1948.       The original copy of the

extract of Village Form No.14 in respect of the Petitioner's uncle Ganpat

Mahadev Thakur issued by the Tahsildar Kudal wherein the caste is recorded

as Thakar, the date of birth is shown as 4­12­1939. The said documents have

been referred to by us in view of the fact that the said documents can be said

to be the pre­Constitution documents whose efficacy in terms of the law laid

down stands on a different footing than the post constitution documents.



3          It is required to be noted that on the basis of the material before it

the STCS committee had by order dated 10­6­2013 had invalidated the

certificate of the Petitioner as belonging to Thakar­Scheduled Tribe. The said

order came to be challenged by the Petitioner by way of Writ Petition No.8757

of 2013. The said Writ Petition came to be allowed by a Division Bench of this

Court A.V.Mohta (as His Lordship then was) and A.A.Sayed JJ., by order dated

28­2­2014 and the matter came to be remanded back to the STCS committee

for a denovo consideration of the Petitioner's claim. The said remand was

ordered on account of non consideration of documents and evidence and

wrong application of law by the Scrutiny Committee on affinity test/issue. In

doing so the Division Bench referred to and relied upon its own judgment in


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Writ Petition No.7343 of 2013 in the matter of Madhuri Nitin Jadhav Vs. State

of Maharashtra & Ors. It is on remand that the instant judgment and order

dated 23­3­2015 came to be passed by the STCS committee.

            The Learned Counsel appearing for the Petitioner Mr. Mendadkar

at the outset would contend that the directions as contained in the said order

dated 28­2­2014 passed in Writ Petition No.8757 of 2013 has not been

followed by the STCS committee in passing the order dated 23­3­2015. The

said contention was based on the fact that the pre­Constitution documents

which we have adverted to in the earlier part of this order have not been given

due weightage and that the STCS committee has once again wrongly placed

reliance on the affinity test to reject the tribe claim of the Petitioner. In view

of the said submission of the Learned Counsel for the Petitioner we proceeded

to consider whether the mandate of the order dated 28­2­2014 passed by the

Division Bench in the said Writ Petition No.8757 of 2013 has been complied

with by the STCS committee or not. On such consideration we find that the

STCS committee has considered the documents which have been produced by

the Petitioner as also considered whether the Petitioner satisfies the affinity

test in so far as the Scheduled Tribe­Thakar is concerned.



4           In so far as the documents are concerned, the STCS committee in

paragraph 9 of its order has referred to the documents which the Petitioner

has placed reliance in support of his claim of belonging to Thakar­Scheduled


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Tribe. The documents on which the Petitioner has laid much store has been

specifically dealt with in the said paragraph 9. On such consideration the

STCS committee has come to the conclusion that the said documents disclose

different caste entries in the school records of the applicant's relatives. The

STCS committee has observed that only because of the entry as Thakar cannot

result in an automatic validation of the tribe claim. The STCS committee has

thereafter observed that the caste Thakar and Scheduled Tribe Thakar are

altogether different entities and they have no ethnic linkage with each other.

The STCS committee has lastly observed that the Thakars from the Sindhudurg

district (erstwhile Ratnagiri district) were included in the list of Nomadic

Tribes for the State of Maharashtra till the year 2004. The STCS committee

thereafter has referred to the documents relating to the revenue entries in

Form No.8 and the 7/12 extract which according to the STCS committee do

not contain the caste details and are therefore not supportive of the tribe claim

of the Applicant.   The STCS committee has gone on to observe that the

Petitioner has not been able to said as to on what basis the caste certificate as

belonging to Thakar­Scheduled Tribe was issued to him. This is in so far as

the documents are concerned.



5           Now coming to the Vigilance enquiry the Vigilance Officer

produced the documents /copies of extracts of School Admission, General

registers pertaining to Applicant and its paternal relatives. It is on perual of


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such entries that the STCS committee has observed that there are conflicting

caste entries in the school record of the Applicant and his paternal relatives

making it difficult to come to a logical conclusion in the matter. The STCS

committee thereafter has referred to the information given by the Applicant in

Form E which is as regards trade, characteristics, surname, customs etc. of the

Thakar's to which the Petitioner's claim belong to.   The STCS committee has

referred to the places of residence of the Applicant's family, surnames of the

Applicant relatives, Traditional occupations of the community , the names of

God­Goddess worshiped by the community, festivals, the main dance of their

community. The said information was compared by the STCS committee with

the information furnished by the representative of the association during the

course of the hearing on 7­3­2015 and the STCS committee on such

comparison came to a conclusion that there was a discrepancy in what the

Petitioner has stated and the information provided by the association of the

Petitioner's community. The STCS committee thereafter has referred to the

books written by scholars which has been referred to in the impugned order.

The STCS committee observed that in view of the fact that there are Thakar

Nomadic Tribe, Thakar in the OBC and now since the removal of the Thakar

from NT and OBC they are to be treated as open caste. It is on account of

similarity in nomenclature that the affinity test has to be applied. The STCS

committee was of the view that considering the trade, character, customs,

traditional occupations etc, the Thakar from Sindhudurg do not fulfill the


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                      aforesaid criteria. The STCS committee observed that considering the entire

                      evidence and the information that came before the STCS committee and in the

                      light of the various pronouncements of this court as well as the Apex Court,

                      the explanation and the submission of the Petitioner could not be accepted.



                      6           As indicated above we have heard the Learned Counsel for the

                      Petitioner, we have also gone through the order passed by the STCS

                      committee. On perusal of the said order we find that the STCS committee has

                      in some detail considered the caste claim of the Petitioner both by considering

                      the documents produced by the Petitioner as well as by applying the affinity

                      test.   In our view, the STCS committee can be said to have followed the

                      mandate of the Division Bench of this Court as directed by order dated 28­2­

                      2014 passed in Writ Petition No.8757 of 2013. We do not find any illegality

                      or infirmity in the order passed by the STCS committee for us to exercise our

                      writ jurisdiction. The Writ Petition is accordingly dismissed.



                      [NITIN W. SAMBRE, J]                                     [R.M.SAVANT, J]


         Digitally
         signed by
         Meera
Meera    Mahesh
Mahesh   Jadhav
         Date:
Jadhav   2018.10.12
         11:58:03
         +0530




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