The main legal point established is that once a community is included in the Scheduled Tribes list, it must be recognized as a Scheduled Tribe as per the Constitution (Scheduled Tribes) Order, 1950. The affinity test should not be the sole criteria to reject a claim for Scheduled Tribe status.

R.K. Deshpande, J.

The challenge in this petition is to the order dated 11-6-2013 passed by the Scheduled Tribe Certificate Scrutiny Committee, Gadchiroli, Division Nagpur, invalidating the claim of the petitioner for ‘Mana’ (Scheduled Tribe Category), and consequently cancelling and confiscating the certificate dated 1-8-2011 issued by the Sub-Divisional Officer, Bramhapuri, in the name of the petitioner as belonging to ‘Mana’, Scheduled Tribe, which is an Entry No. 18 in the Constitution (Scheduled Tribes) Order, 1950.

2. Before the Committee, the petitioner produced about six documents indicating his caste and that of his forefathers and blood relatives as ‘Mana”. The document produced pertaining to the pre-constitution period is in respect of the great grandfather Madho s/o Ako Mana, which is a revenue record of the year produced was in the name of Lavha s.o Madho, who was the grandfather of the petitioner showing the caste ‘Mana’ in the revenue record of the year 1970-71. The petitioner also produced the caste validity certificate issued by the same Committee in the name of Gangadhar Balaji Ghodmare, the real brother of the petitioner, showing his caste as ‘Mana’. The Police Vigilance Cell of the Committee conducted an enquiry and found that all these documents indicate the caste of the petitioner and his forefathers and blood relatives as ‘Mana’. The relationship of the petitioner with the persons in whose names the documents are executed is admitted to be of blood relation.

3. The Committee records the finding that the entries in the school and revenue records of the blood relatives of the petitioner for the period from 1921-22 to 1977 consistently records the caste ‘Mana’. However, all such documents are rejected mainly on the following reasoning :

(a) that ‘Mana’ community was included in the list of Scheduled Tribes in relation to the State of Maharashtra for the first time in the year 1960, that too in the specified area only, and the petitioner has failed to establish that he or his forefathers hail from the said area and migrated to the present place of their residence, from the said specified scheduled area.

(b) that there are non-tribal communities like ‘Badwaik Mana’, ‘Khand Mana’, ‘Kshatriya Mana’, ‘Kunbi Mana’, ‘Maratha Mana’, ‘Gond Mana’, ‘Mani’/’Mane’, etc., and the petitioner has failed to satisfy crucial affinity test to establish that he belongs to ‘Mana, Scheduled Tribe’, which is an entry at Serial No. 18 in the Constitution (Scheduled Tribes) Order, 1950,

(c) that in the year 1967, ‘Mana’ community was included in the list of Other Backward Classes at Serial No. 268 and later on in the list of Special Backward Classes at Serial No. 2 in relation to the State of Maharashtra, and

(d) that the documents produced simply indicate the caste as ‘Mana’ and not ‘Mana, Scheduled Tribe’.

4. The President issued the Constitutional (Scheduled Tribes) Order, 1950 in exercise of the power conferred by clause (2) of Article 342 of the Constitution of India. By clause 2 of that Order, it was provided that the tribes or tribal communities, or parts of, or groups within, tribes or tribal communities, specified in Parts I to XXII of the Scheduled to the Order shall, in relation to the States to which those Parts respective relate, be deemed to be Scheduled Tribes so far as regards members thereof residents in the localities specified in relation to them respectively in those Parts of that Schedule.

5. Initially, Entry No. 12 in the relevant Part in the Schedule to the Order read as “Gond, including Madia (Maria) and Mudia (Muria)”. By the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes Orders (Amendment) Act No. 63 of 1956, the said Entry No. 12 was substituted by Entry No. 12 in paragraph 7 of Part VIII(A) of the Schedule to the Order, which was as follows :

“7. In (1) Melghat tahsil of the Amravati district.

(2) Gadchiroli and Sironcha tahsils of the Chanda district.

(3) Kelapur, Wani and Yeotmal tasils of the Yeotmal district :

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