1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY, BENCH AT AURANGABAD WRIT PETITION NO.871 OF 2010 Ratnakar s/o Onkar Koli, Age : 69 years, Occu.Agriculture, R/o Gombhi Tq. Bhusawal, Dist. Jalgaon ..PETITIONER VERSUS 1. The State of Maharashtra, Through Secretary, Tribal Development Department, Mantralaya, Mumbai - 32 2. Scheduled Tribe Certificate Verification & Scrutiny Committee, Nandurbar Division, Nandurbar, Through its Member - Secretary 3. Tahsildar, Bhusawal, Dist. Jalgaon 4. Collector, Jalgaon Dist. Jalgaon ..RESPONDENTS Mr G.V. Wani, Advocate for the petitioner; Mrs A.V. Gondhalekar, A.G.P. for respondents no.1, 3 & 4; Mr R.P. Phatake, Advocate for respondent no.2. CORAM : P.V. HARDAS AND N.D. DESHPANDE, JJ DATE : 16th June, 2010 ORAL JUDGMENT [ PER P.V. HARDAS , J ] 2 Rule. Rule returnable forthwith. With the consent of learned Counsel for the parties this petition is heard finally at the stage of admission. 2. By this petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India the petitioner prays for directing the respondent - Scrutiny Committee to decide the proposal of caste verification pertaining to the petitioner and also prays for directing the respondents not to initiate any adverse action against the petitioner for failure of the petitioner to get his caste verified by the Scrutiny Committee. 3. It appears that the petitioner is an elected Sarpanch of the Group Grampanchayat of village Sunasgaon, Tq. Bhusawal and claims to be belonging to "Tokare Koli", which is recognised as Scheduled Tribe. The proposal of the petitioner came to be forwarded to the respondent - Scrutiny Committee for verification. It further appears that the respondent - Scrutiny Committee returned back the proposal of the petitioner and others to the Tahsildar and the Tahsildar in turn forwarded the same to the Talathi with a request to hand over the certificates to the petitioner and others. Thus, the net result is that the caste certificate of the petitioner has not been verified by the Scrutiny 3 Committee. 4. Learned Counsel for the respondents are unable to ascribe the reason as to why the caste certificate of the petitioner came to be returned back without being verified. The Committee cannot abdicate its responsibility of verifying the caste claim, regardless of the fact whether the candidate whose caste certificate is submitted for verification is contesting as a candidate or has been defeated. Even otherwise, in case of a defeated candidate the Committee, at the most, would not be bound by the guidelines of the Government for deciding the claim within a stipulated period. 5. In that light of the matter, therefore, we direct the respondents to forward the proposal of validity of the caste certificate of the petitioner to the respondent - Scrutiny Committee within four weeks from today and further direct the respondent - Scrutiny Committee to verify the caste claim of the petitioner as expeditiously as possible and preferably within six months from its receipt. 6. Since the claim of the petitioner as belonging to "Tokare Koli" is being directed to be verified by the Scrutiny Committee, the respondents are directed not to take any adverse action 4 against the petitioner till the caste claim is decided by the Scrutiny Committee. 7. Rule is thus made absolute on the above terms with no order as to costs. ( N.D. DESHPANDE ) ( P.V.HARDAS ) JUDGE JUDGE amj/wp871.10