THE HON'BLE SRI JUSTICE C.V.NAGARJUNA REDDY WRIT PETITION No.22626 of 2010 Date: 02.11.2010 Between: Irumalla @ Kurma Laxmi and another ..... Petitioners AND The State of Andhra Pradesh, represented by its Secretary, Hyderabad and others .....Respondents Counsel for the Petitioners: Sri A.V. Sesha Sai Counsel for Respondents: Assistant Government Pleader for Revenue The Court made the following: ORDER: The petitioners, who claim to be the son and daughter of deceased Irumalla Balaiah, who was stated to have died accidentally, filed the present writ petition for a Mandamus to declare the letter No.12138/SER.II(2)/2006-4 dated 12.07.2006 issued by respondent No.1 and the consequential memo dated 26.07.2010 issued by respondent No.2 as illegal. The petitioners are among the claimants before the Commissioner for Workmen Compensation in W.C.No.1542 of 1996. On the ground that their relationship with the deceased was not established, their claim was rejected. Challenging the said rejection order, the petitioners along with others filed C.M.A.No.28 of 2001. This Court, vide order dated 02.05.2008, allowed the said C.M.A. and remanded the matter to the Commissioner for Workmen Compensation for a fresh adjudication. In the present writ petition, the grievance of the petitioners is that while respondent No.2 is not granting family membership certificate, the Commissioner is insisting on such a certificate to establish the relationship between the petitioners and the deceased. Respondent No.2 in his memo dated 26.07.2010 declined to issue the certificate on the ground that under letter dated 12.07.2006, the Mandal Revenue Officers (MROs) can only give family membership certificate in respect of the Government employees and that too to receive Government dues, if any, payable to Government servants in case of their death. Sri A. V. Sesha Sai, the learned counsel for the petitioners, stated that the said letter confining the powers of MROs to issue family membership certificate only to Government employees is irrational and arbitrary. In my opinion, this submission is without any merit. The classification made in the said letter is based on intelligible differentia between the two categories of people, namely, employees and unemployed. In case of employees, it is not difficult for the MROs to verify the family members that deceased Government employee had left behind, while it may not be possible for him to ascertain with certainty the actual family members, in case of private individuals other than the Government employees. In this view of the matter, I do not find any irrationality or arbitrariness in the impugned letter dated 12.07.2006. The learned counsel for the petitioners further argued that the Commissioner is insisting on production of family membership certificate from MRO. In my opinion, such insistence does not conform to law because in the absence of any power or obligation on MRO to issue family membership certificate, the Commissioner is not justified in insisting on production of such certificate. The petitioners are entitled to adduce any other evidence both oral and documentary to substantiate their claim that they are family members and legal heirs of the deceased workman. Subject to the above observations, the Writ Petition is disposed of. As a sequel to disposal of the writ petition, W.P.M.P.No.28843 of 2010 filed by the petitioners for interim relief is disposed of as infructuous. ________________________ C.V.NAGARJUNA REDDY, J 02nd November, 2010 GHN