1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE OF BOMBAY BENCH AT AURANGABAD WRIT PETITION NO.1552 OF 2009 Shila d/o Ramrao Pune Age: 22 Yrs., occu. Agril. r/o Vank Takli, Tq. Parali, District Beed. - PETITIONER VERSUS 1) The State of Maharashtra Through it’s Secretary Tribal Development Deptt., Mantralaya, Mumbai-32. 2) The Scheduled Tribe Certificate Scrutiny Committee, Aurangabad Division, Aurangabad. 3) The Collector, Beed Tq. and District Beed. - RESPONDENTS ***** Mr.PV Jadhavar, Advocate for Petitioner; Mr.SK Tambe,AGP for Resp.Nos. 1 and 3; Mr.Mr.PS Patil, Advocate for Resp.No.2. ----- 2 CORAM : NARESH H. PATIL & K.U.CHANDIWAL, JJ. DATE : 17th November, 2009. ORAL JUDGMENT (PER: NARESH H. PATIL,J.) . Rule returnable forthwith, heard finally. 2) The petitioner claims to be belonging to `Koli Mahadeo’ scheduled tribe. The petitioner contested the election of Gram Panchayat from reserved category, wherein he was elected as a member. 3) The Collector Beed forwarded the tribe claim of the petitioner to the Respondent No.2- Committee for verification. The Respondent No.2- Committee invalidated tribe claim of the petitioner by order dated 30.12.2008, which order of the Committee is challenged by the petitioner in this petition. 4) After the order was passed by the Committee, according to the petitioner, he came into possession of a document of the year 1352 Fasli, i.e. revenue record maintained by Collector, Parbhani. Marathi translation of the said document is placed on record by the 3 petitioner. According to the petitioner, in the said document of 1352 fasli, the caste of petitioner’s father is recorded as `Mahadeo Koli’. 5) In the facts and circumstances of the case, we find that the Committee shall consider this old document which is of the year 1352 Fasli. Therefore, for the said reason, the matter will have to be remanded back to the Committee for fresh adjudication of the tribe claim of the petitioner. 6) The impugned order dated 30.12.2008 passed by the Respondent No.2-Committee is quashed and set aside. For the reasons stated above, the matter is remanded back to the Committee, with a direction to the Committee to finally dispose of the tribe claim of the petitioner on its own merits within a period of three months from the date of receipt of the order of this Court. 7) The petitioner is entitled to place the document, which is of the year 1351 Fasli, i.e. Entry in the revenue record, maintained by the Collectorate, Parbhani, which is annexed at Exhibit-I of the petition. The petitioner shall be heard with regard to the said document. The 4 Committee is entitled to call for any report for assessing the authenticity of the said document and after having satisfied, it shall finally adjudicate the tribe claim of the petitioner within the stipulated period stated above. 8) The petitioner shall appear before the Respondent – Committee on 30th November, 2009 at 11.00 a.m. and shall cooperate with the Committee. In absence of any cooperation on the part of the petitioner, the Committee is entitled to proceed ex parte and pass final order on its own merits. 9) Rule is made absolute in the aforesaid terms. sd/- sd/- (K.U.CHANDIWAL) (NARESH H. PATIL) JUDGE JUDGE bdv/wp1552.09 Authenticated copy (BD VADNERE,PS)