1` IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY NAGPUR BENCH, NAGPUR Writ Petition No. 1957/2007 Ku. Yogita d/o Uttamrao Nandanwar vs. State of Maharashtra, through Secretary, Tribal Development Deptt. Mantralaya, Mumbai 32 and others. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court's orders Court's or Judge's or directions and Registrar's orders. Orders. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Mrs. Mrunal Shesh, Advocate for the petitioner. Mrs. S.W. Deshpande, Advocate for R 1 and 2: Absent. Mr. P.A.Deshmukh, Advocate for respondent no.3. CORAM : A.P.Lavande & Prasanna B. Varale, JJ DATE OF RESERVING : 5.1.2009 DATE OF PRONOUNCEMENT: 14.1.2009 Heard Mrs. Shesh, learned counsel for the petitioner and Mr. Deshmukh, learned counsel for respondent no.3. 2. By this petition the petitioner challenges order dated 30.08.1999 issued by respondent no.2 invalidating the caste certificate of the petitioner issued by Sub Divisional Officer, Pusad. 3. Briefly, the facts leading to filing of the petition are as under: The petitioner wanted to take admission to D.Ed. course in reserved category of scheduled tribe. Since the petitioner did not have the certificate issued by 2` the Caste Scrutiny Committee the petitioner filed Writ Petition No. 3268/97 seeking directions to Shikshan Shastra Vidyalaya, Yavatmal to give admission to the petitioner in reserved category of scheduled tribe. This court by order dated 23.6.1998 granted interim relief subject to result of the petition. The petitioner took admission and appeared for the first year examination in the year 1998-99. She also attended the academic year 1999-2000 and appeared for the examination but the mark-sheet was not supplied to the petitioner. In the meantime, respondent no.3 referred the caste claim of the petitioner for verification to respondent no.2. The respondent no.2 by order dated 30.8.1999 cancelled the caste certificate of the petitioner issued by the Sub Divisional Officer, Pusad. Writ Petition No. 3268/97 was disposed of by this court by Judgment and order dated 15.9.1998. This court directed the petitioner to appear before respondent no.2 and to submit all documents in support of her claim and further directed the respondent no.2 to take a decision within a period of three months. The petitioner was allowed to continue to prosecute her course as a provisional candidate. The court directed that in case the caste claim of the petitioner could not be upheld the admission of the petitioner would stand cancelled after expiry of 15 days from the decision of the Caste Scrutiny Committee. 3` 4. It is the case of the petitioner that she asked Advocate B.M.Khan to file petition challenging the order passed and Writ Petition No. 1328/2000 was filed in this court. It is further the case of the petitioner that on 27.9.2005 she contacted Advocate Mr. Khan and filed Civil Application No. 1668/08 in W.P.No. 3268/97 on 27.9.2005 seeking directions against the College to declare the result and supply mark sheet to the petitioner. The petitioner was given an understanding by her advocate that the matter was pending before this court. Since the petitioner was in desperate need of mark sheet she along with her father came to Nagpur and found that Writ Petition No. 3268/97 was disposed of on 15.9.1998 and Writ Petition No. 1328/2000 was not actually filed by the petitioner and it was filed by some other person. Similarly, Civil Application No. 1668/2005 was not filed in this court. According to the petitioner, her advocate had cheated her. Thereafter she contacted another lawyer and filed the present petition on 15.11.2006. 5. Mrs. Shesh, learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that there are no laches on the part of the petitioner since it was only in the year 2006 that she came to know about the order dated 15.9.1998 passed by the Division Bench of this court disposing of the writ petition no. 3268/97 and also realised that her lawyer had not filed petition challenging the order passed by the Caste 4` Scrutiny Committee or Civil Application No. 1668/05 seeking directions against the College. The learned counsel, therefore, submitted that the petition is not liable to be dismissed on the ground of unexplained delay and laches. On merits, the learned counsel submitted that the respondent no.2 did not give adequate opportunity to the petitioner to put up her case and has also not considered the materials on record while passing the impugned order. The learned counsel, therefore, submitted that the impugned order passed by respondent no.2 is liable to be set aside with a direction to the respondent no.2 to validate the caste certificate of the petitioner. 6. Mr. Deshmukh, learned counsel for respondent no.3 submitted that the admission of the petitioner was provisional and in terms of the order dated 15.9.1998 passed by this Court in Writ Petition No. 3268/97 the admission of the petitioner stood cancelled after expiry of 15 days from the date of decision of respondent no.2, and, therefore, respondent no.3 was justified in not issuing mark-sheet to the petitioner. 7. Having considered the submissions made by the learned counsel for the parties and having perused the record we find no merit in the present petition. Firstly, this court while disposing of Writ Petition No. 3268/97 has clearly held that if the caste claim of the petitioner 5` could not be upheld the admission of the petitioner would stand cancelled after expiry of 15 days from the decision. We find it extremely difficult to believe that the then advocate of the petitioner did not file any petition and misled her in believing that he had filed the petition challenging the said order as well as the civil application seeking directions against the College. In para no. 6 of the petition, the petitioner has made a categorical statement that her advocate had prepared Writ Petition No. 1328/2000 and had filed the same in this court challenging the order passed by the Caste Scrutiny Committee. Moreover, there is absolutely no reason why the petitioner waited for a considerable long time i.e. from the year 2000 to 2005 to seek directions against the College to supply her mark sheet as claimed by the petitioner. In our considered opinion, the petitioner suffers from gross un-explained delay and laches. The impugned order was passed by the respondent no.2 in the year 1999 and the present petition has been filed in the year 2006. We are unable to accept the reasons given by the petitioner for approaching this court after a period of almost seven years. On this ground alone the petition is liable to be dismissed. 8. Even on merit we find no infirmity in the impugned order. The impugned order discloses that sufficient opportunities were given to the petitioner which 6` the petitioner did not avail and as such respondent no.2 was justified in passing the impugned order on the basis of the materials on record. Therefore, even on merit we find find no ground to interfere with the impugned order. In the result, therefore, we find no merit in the present petition. Hence, the petition is rejected with no order as to costs. JUDGE JUDGE patle