Kriti Agrawal –
The Bombay High Court invalidated Amravati Lok Sabha member Navneet Kaur Rana’s caste certificate, stating it was obtained fraudulently using forged documents, and ordered her to surrender it within six weeks.
A division bench of Justice RD Dhanuka and Justice VG Bisht imposed a monetary penalty of Rs 2 lakh, which she must pay to the Maharashtra Legal Services Authority within two weeks.
The Court said, “The application (for caste certificate) was prepared with the motive of making a fraudulent claim in order to allow respondent no.3 (Rana) to fight the election for the position of Member of Parliament on a seat reserved for a Scheduled Caste candidate.”
The High Court delivered its decision in response to a case brought by social worker Anandrao Adsule, who sought the deletion of a caste certificate issued by the Mumbai Deputy Collector on August 30, 2013, designating Ms. Rana as belonging to the ‘Mochi’ caste.
The petitioner claimed that Ms. Rana obtained the caste certificate through the use of falsified and fraudulent papers. It alleged the certificate was obtained under the influence of Navneet Rana’s husband, Ravi Rana, Maharashtra Legislative Assembly member.
The bench remarked that Navneet Rana’s original birth certificate did not specify the caste ‘Mochi.’
The Court went on to say that the inspection committee had done the petitioner injustice and that it had ‘Imprimatur on such bogus caste claim.’
According to the High Court, the terms ‘Chamar’ and ‘Mochi’ are not synonymous and represent distinct identities.
The Bench stated, “The inspection committee is not an adjudicating authority, but rather an administrative body that checks facts, analyzes a specific claim of caste status, and determines whether the claim of caste/tribe status is correct or not.”
