1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY NAGPUR BENCH : NAGPUR WRIT PETITION NO. 3463 OF 2004 (Suresh Ramdas Gite .....versus...... State of Maharashtra and others. ) WRIT PETITION NO. 5433 OF 2004 (Vinayak Ramdas Gite .....versus...... State of Maharashtra and others. ) Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court's orders Court's or Judge's orders or directions and Registrar's orders. CORAM : B.P. DHARMADHIKARI AND F.M. REIS, JJ. DATED : AUGUST 17, 2009. Heard Shri V.R. Choudhari, learned Counsel for petitioners, learned A.G.P. for respondent no.1 and Shri Sambre, learned Counsel for respondent no.2. Claim of petitioners as belonging to Thakur Scheduled Tribe has been rejected by the Caste Scrutiny Committee, after noticing that the affinity is not established. The Scrutiny Committee has found that though there are documents showing that petitioners belong to Thakur Community, it was not clear whether those documents pertains to Thakur Scheduled Tribe. One of the old document of 1970 was found to have containing entry of caste as Bhat. Advocate Shri Choudhari, in this background contends that, there are other documents of 1917 which 2 clearly shows the entry as Thakur. He further argues that all documents thereafter are consistently mentioning the caste of petitioners, their ancestors as Thakur. He further states that, the affinity test is satisfied and because answers given were correct, the Scrutiny Committee has ignored those answers by labeling them as information supplied by Bookish knowledge. He contends that the validity therefore, needs to be granted. Shri Sambre, learned Counsel appearing for respondent Scrutiny Committee and learned A.G.P. for respondent State Government, however, point out that the statements made by brother Dayaram Gajanan Gite was also considered and statements of elders in the family, particularly one Asaram Pandurang Gite, 70 years and others were recorded. The Traits and customs then disclosed are materially different than the traits and customs disclosed by the petitioners in their statement before the Vigilence Cell. They contends that, after comparing the statements, the affinity test is found to be not satisfied. This finding and exercise is not in dispute. The Scrutiny Committee has mentioned the Traits, Characteristics, Customs disclosed by the petitioners (aged 26 and 29 years respectively), in paragraph no.9 of its order. The Characteristics and Customs disclosed by Asaram Pandurang Gite, Smt.Ratnabai Gajanan Gite are disclosed in paragraph no.11 of the order. The comparison of both the statements clearly show that the petitioners have made improvements over what ever was disclosed by their Cousin Paternal Uncle and then their Paternal Aunt. In 3 view of this position, the Scrutiny Committee is correct in holding that the affinity disclosed by the petitioners is on the basis of the information by bookish knowledge. We find that no case is made out warranting interference in Writ Jurisdiction. Writ Petitions are therefore, dismissed. However, in the circumstances of the case, there shall be no order as to costs. JUDGE JUDGE Rgd.