The central legal point established in the judgment is the requirement for corroborative evidence and the application of the affinity test in determining Scheduled Tribe status.

JUDGMENT

1. The present petition is an outcome of an order of invalidation of a Tribe claim of the Petitioner as 'Mana', Scheduled Tribe.

2. We have heard the learned respective Counsel for the parties.

3. The brief facts of the present petition are as under:

The Petitioner was appointed as a 'Police Constable' on a reserved post for Scheduled Tribe. Since, the Petitioner was not holding a validity certificate, his Tribe claim was referred to the Respondent No.2-Caste Scrutiny Committee, on 01.11.2012. Thereupon the Caste Scrutiny Committee conducted enquiry through Police Vigilance Cell and on receiving report the explanation was called from the Petitioner. The Committee thereafter considered the Police Vigilance Cell report, reply to the same and documents submitted by the Petitioner and rejected the Tribe claim of the Petitioner, vide order dated 27.07.2018. The legality and correctness of the same is questioned in the present matter.

4. Shri Dhok, the learned Counsel for the Petitioner submits that the Committee has not made proper evaluation and assessment of the documents available on record, and thus, committed error.

5. He further draws attention of this Court to the list of documents and pointed out that two documents i.e. relating to grand father of the Petitioner, Janya @ Yadu, of the year 1923-24 having entry 'Mana' and cousin grand father-Dharma, of the year 1948-49, having entry 'Mana', the validity certificate issued to the cousin of the Petitioner Ghanshyam Bhaskar Hanwate as well, have been ignored by the Committee on unsustainable ground.

6. He further submits that the Committee has not considered the various judgments of this Court and the Apex Court, observing thata pre-Independence period document having entry 'Mana' is sufficient to hold that the candidate belongs to 'Mana', Scheduled Tribe.

7. The learned Counsel for the Petitioner, in support of his contentions, has placed reliance on the following judgments - 2003 [3] Mh.L.J. 513 Mana Adim Jamat Mandal v. State of Maharashtra and others; 2010 [6] Mh.L.J. 401. Apoorva Vinay Nichale v. Divisional Caste Certificate Scrutiny Committee No.1 and others; 2018 [1] ABR 506 Ankush Yashwantrao Mankar v. Scheduled Tribe Certificates Scrutiny Committee, Gadchiroli and others; 2018 [2] Mh.L.J. 460 Gajanan Pandurang Shende v. Head Master, Govt. Ashram School, Dongargaon Salod and others; 2018 [2] Mh.L.J. 766 Narendra Balaji Ghodmare v. Scheduled Tribe Certificate Scrutiny Committee, Gadchiroli and another and, 2019 [1] Mh.L.J. 757 Shubham Sharad Gadmade v. Scheduled Tribe Caste Certificate Scrutiny Committee, Nagpur and others.

8. Per contra, Ms. Deshpande learned Assistant Government Pleader appearing for the Respondent Committee, has opposed the present petition and submits that the entry 'Mana' of pre-independence period, though holds higher degree of probative value, but, corroborative evidence is needed to establish that such entry is relating to Scheduled Tribe, which the Petitioner has failed to establish, and therefore, the Tribe claim of the Petitioner was rightly rejected by the Caste Scrutiny Committee.

9. She further submits that, the validity certificate upon which a reliance is sought to be placed, was issued without an enquiry by the Vigilance Cell, and therefore, the same cannot be relied upon in absence of corroborative material.

10. To consider the rival contentions of the parties, we have perused the record, whereupon it is revealed that there are two documents produced by the Petitioner of pre-independence period, i.e. a document of the year 1923-24 relating to grand father and another document is of the year 1948-49 relating to cousin grand father of the Petitioner, having entries as 'Mana'. Both the aforesaid entries are found in revenue record.

11. The reason given by the Respondent - Committee, for not relying upon the aforesaid entries, is that the Petitioner failed to establish that the same are relating to Scheduled Tribe.

12. Now it is a settled law th