Writ petition No.1673 of 2010 1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY, BENCH AT AURANGABAD WRIT PETITION NO.1673 of 2010 Dattatraya Shankar Dharurkar Age : 52 Sex : Male R/o. At postAshti Taluka Partur District Jalna Petitioner Versus 1] The State Of Maharashtra Through Its Secretary Social Welfre Department Mumbai 2] The Education Officer (secondary) Zilla Parishad, Jalna 3] The Head Master Zilla Parishad High School, Ashti, Dist. Jalna Respondents Mr. C.G. Patil, Advocate for the petitioner Mrs. A.V. Gondhalekar, AGP for the respondents. CORAM : B.R. GAVAI & R.M. BORDE,JJ. DATE : 1ST DECEMBER, 2010. ORAL JUDGMENT [ PER B.R. GAVAI, J] : Writ petition No.1673 of 2010 2 1] Rule. Rule made returnable forthwith. Heard by consent. 2] The petitioner has filed the present petition for directions to the respondent Nos. 2 and 3 to take entries of their school record or petitioner's caste as “Gawali” and surname as “Dharurkar”. It is the contention of the learned counsel for the petitioner that though an application has been made to the respondent No.2 through the respondent No.3, the same has been rejected. 3] In the affidavit in reply filed on behalf of the respondent NO.2 it is stated that since the petitoiner has left the school in the year 1974, the Education Officer would not have jurisdiction to change the entries pertaining to the surname and caste of the petitioner. 4] We find that the stand taken by the respondent is not tenable in law. The Division Bench of this court, in Writ Petition NO. 4264 of 2009, relying upon the Govt. Resolution No. GAC -1083/89/SE-2, dated 16th March, 1983 read with clauses 12 to 15 of Appendix six of the Secondary School Code, has taken a view that even after a student has left the school, the Education Officer has jurisdiction to effect change in the entries with respect to the caste, date of birth etc. We , therefore, find that the stand taken by the respondent No.2 was not justified in not considering the claim of the petitioner. Writ petition No.1673 of 2010 3 5] We, therefore, allow the petition with the following directions :- (i) The petitioner shall make an application to the respondent No.2 within a period of two weeks from today. (ii) On such application being made to the respondent No.3, the respondent No.3 shall forward the same to the respondent No.2 within a period of 3 weeks from the date of receipt thereof. (iii) On receipt of the said proposal, the respondent No.2 shall take appropriate decision in accordance with what has been observed hereinabove,within a period of 4 months from the receipt of proposal from the respondent No.2. (iv)We make it clear that we have not considered the matter on its merit. The respondent No.2 would take a decision on the basis of the material placed by the petitioner before him. Rule made absolute on the above terms, with no orders as to costs. [R.M. BORDE,J.] [B.R. GAVAI,J.] grt/wp