Bombay HC sides with tribal student in higher education pursuit

A student had to approach the high court to validate his tribal status, an exercise that was also done by two of his family members some years ago. Representation pic

If a man and his brother belong to a scheduled tribe, a fact validated by the Bombay High Court, then will his son also belong to the same tribe? The simple logical answer has evaded the bright minds of the Scheduled Tribe Certificate Scrutiny Committee. In a classic example of how government machinery operates, a student had to approach the high court to validate his tribal status, an exercise that was also done by two of his family members some years ago.

The case

The student had obtained a certificate that he belonged to the Thakar schedule tribe in March 2020. His certificate was sent by the education institute in which he had sought admission for scrutiny to the Scheduled Tribe Certificate Scrutiny Committee. The committee directed the vigilance cell to conduct an enquiry and submit a report. As per the report of the vigilance cell the student failed to prove his caste claim. Thus the committee on November 15, 2021, invalidated the scheduled tribe certificate of the student.

This was Déjà vu for the tribal family, as the committee had similarly invalidated their tribal community status of student's father Satish Thakur and his uncle Aniruddha Thakur in 2016. The duo approached the high court in 2017 and in 2021 the division bench of the high court set aside the order of the committee and directed it to issue the petitioners with scheduled tribe certificates.

Previous High Court observations

The judgment dated 20 April 2021 passed by the Division Bench of this Court in Writ petition No. 3770 of 2017 is on record. The Division Bench has rendered detailed judgment running into almost 30 pages and analyzing the evidence and the legal position, has passed the following operative order: "In our view, the impugned order dated 15th June, 2016 passed by the Scrutiny Committee invalidating the claim of the petitioner is totally perverse and is unsustainable."

The other side

S B Kalel, assistant government pleader (AGP) for the state, informed the court, "We are not informed that any review application for the order dated April 20 2021 was filed by the Scrutiny Committee. When the petition came up on board on 1 April 2024, we had adjourned the petition to enable the learned AGP to take instructions whether the review petition, in fact, was filed. The learned AGP informed that this order of 1 April 2024 has informed the scrutiny committee. However, it has been orally informed that review is in contemplation. Thus, till date, no review petition has been filed."

Division bench order

The division bench of Bombay High Court, comprising of Justice M M Sathaye and Justice Nitin Jamdar said in their judgment: "The judgment was passed by this Court almost three years ago. In these circumstances, we find no reason for not to follow the order passed in the case of petitioner's father and brother to maintain consistency in the petitioner case, otherwise it will lead to conflicting positions where the division bench of this court declared that the father and uncle of the petitioner as belonging to one community and as a result of the impugned order by scrutiny committee, the petitioner would belong to another community."

Advocate speak

Advocate Rajeshwar Panchal, who represented the petitioner said, "It is notable that the scrutiny committee heavily relied upon the affinity test as if it was a litmus test. In short, the decision of the scrutiny committee meant that the petitioner and his father belonged to different communities. Taking a serious note of the perverse decisions made by the committee, the high court has quashed and set aside its decision and also issued directions in terms of prayers. I hope this order would be a precedent to be followed by the committee in similarly placed cases."

Apr 22
Date of the judgement