1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE OF BOMBAY : AURANGABAD BENCH WRIT PETITION NO. 597 OF 2009 1. Vijay s/o. Ashok Pawar - - - Petitioner age 34 years, occ. nil, r/o. Davkhar Khalwadi, Naka No.5, Rahuri, tq. Rahuri, dist. Ahmednagar. versus 1. The State of Maharashtra. 2. The Sub Divisional Officer, Karjat, taluka Karjat, District Ahmednagar. 3. Chief Officer, Zilla Parishad, Ahmednagar. 4. Deputy Chief Executive Officer, General Administration, Zilla Parishad, Ahmednagar. 5. Subhash s/o. Laxman Pawar, age 31 years, occ. service, Primary Health Centre, Kuldharan, taluka Karjat, Dist. Ahmednagar. 6. Scheduled Tribe Certificate Scrutiny Committee, Pune Division, Pune. - - - - - Respondents Shri D. D. Pokharkar, Advocate for petitioner. 2 Shri K. G. Patil, Asstt. Govt. Pleader for respondents Nos.1 and 2. Shri S. T. Shelke, Advocate for respondents Nos.3 and 4. Shri N. V. Gaware, Advocate for respondent No.5. Shri R. P. Phatke, Advocate for respondent No.6. CORAM : B. R. GAVAI & N. D. DESHPANDE, JJ. Dated : 29th September 2009 ORAL JUDGMENT [ PER N. D. DESHPANDE, J.] : 1. Rule. Rule returnable forthwith. Heard both sides. 2. The petitioner by this petition has challenged the appointment of respondent No.5 to the post of Class IV employee and is seeking a writ of mandamus for quashing and setting aside the said appointment. 3. The material facts can be briefly stated as under : An advertisement in Daily Lokmat dated 9-5-2006 was published inviting applications for the posts of Class IV employees (267 posts) in Zilla Parishad, by the respondents Nos.3 and 4. 20 posts were reserved for S.T. category, one post for Ex-servicemen, 3 one post for Project Affected/ Earth Quake Affected, one post for blind, six posts for women, one post for sports person and ten posts amongst S.T. category from horizontal reserved category. 4. The last date for submission of application was 22-5-2006. The date of written examination was 26-6-2006, date of interview was on 4-7-2006 and date of publication of the select list of the candidate was on 15-7-2006. 5. The petitioner was one of the candidatures, so also the respondent No.5 for the said post. It is the case of the petitioner that along with his application form, respondent No.5 had submitted a caste certificate issued by the respondent No.2. According to the petitioner, aforesaid caste certificate of the year 2004 found to be false and bogus and it is a forged document. Under the Right to Information Act, the details about the said caste certificate of 2004 were obtained by him from respondent no.3 as well as Health Officer, P. H. C., Kuldharan, taluka Karjat, district Ahmednagar. The petitioner believed that the respondent No.5 was aware of the fact that his caste certificate of the year 2004 could not be validated by the Caste Scrutiny Committee and, therefore, procured one more caste certificate from Sub Divisional Officer, Kurudwad, 4 district Solapur on or about October/ November 2006 and Sub Divisional Officer, Kurudwad issued a Caste Certificate as Pardhi (S.T. 38) to the respondent No.5 and it was sent by the respondent No.5 to Caste Scrutiny Committee at Pune for verification and obtaining validity certificate. Consequently, the Scrutiny Committee at Pune for S.T. validated his claim and issued validity certificate dated 20-1-2007 after verifying his Caste Certificate dated 17-10-2006 and on that basis, respondent No.5 was given an appointment as Class IV employee in Zilla Parishad and he was posted at P.H.C., Kuldharan, taluka Karjat, district Ahmednagar. Therefore, petitioner made several representations to respondent No.3 that action should be taken against respondent No.5 who had earlier obtained a Caste Certificate in the year 2004, issued by Sub Divisional Officer, Karjat stating that there was no entry about the issuance of such caste certificate to the respondent No.5 as "Hindu Pardhi". 6. Bone of contention of the petitioner is that respondent No.5 had submitted his caste certificate of the year 2004 issued by Sub Divisional Officer, Karjat along with his application, in May 2005 and the said caste certificate of the year 2004 is false and bogus. As such, his candidature at the time of submission of application did 5 not fulfill all the requirements and the conditions as per the advertisement. As such, his impugned appointment on the basis of caste certificate dated 17-10-2006/ 3-11-2006 issued by Sub Divisional Officer, Kurudwadi, verified and validated subsequently on 20-1-2007 by the Scrutiny Committee at Pune is a fraud played by him for getting appointment in collusion with respondents Nos.3 and 4. However, petitioner submitted that he is not challenging the selection procedure but challenging the appointment of respondent No.5 on the ground of fraud for getting appointment order dated 22-3-2007. 7. It is seen that the petition challenging the appointment of respondent No.5 came to be filed on 8-10-2008 and the delay occasioned because of certain time required by the petitioner to collect necessary information under the Right to Information Act. We have carefully gone through the averments made in the petition and various objections raised in the course of arguments. It is seen that petitioner neither challenged the caste of respondent No.5 nor his validity certificate issued by Caste Scrutiny Committee at Pune which was relied by the respondents Nos.3 and 4 at the time of his appointment. Moreover, petitioner did not say or whisper in the petition that the respondent No.5 does not belong to the alleged 6 caste and challenge his caste claim for such appointment. Merely, because there is communication that there is no entry found in the register for issuance of alleged certificate in the year 2004 would not be enough to reject the application for non compliance of the requirements or conditions as per the advertisement. Thus, no case of fraud is established or proved on record. 8. Petition is devoid of bona fides and merits also and deserves to be dismissed. Rule discharged. ( N.D.DESHPANDE, J. ) ( B. R. GAVAI, J. ) pnk/wp59709