(1) 966 WP-4275.2025 + 1.odt IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY BENCH AT AURANGABAD 966 WRIT PETITION NO. 4275 OF 2025 Vishakha d/o Dattarao Sakharwad Age : 31 yrs, occ : service R/o At Post Nandkheda, District Parbhani Petitioner Versus 1. The State of Maharashtra 2. Commissioner of State Tax Goods and Services Tax Dept., Maharashtra State, Mumbai 3. Assistant Charity Commissioner of State Tax, Goods and Services Tax Department, Parbhani 4. Scheduled Tribe Certificate Verification Committee, Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar Respondents WITH WRIT PETITION NO. 4338 OF 20 2025 Ganpat s/o Kachruba Sakharwad Age : 55 yrs, occ : service R/o At Post Nandkheda, Taluka and District Parbhani Petitioner Versus 1. The State of Maharashtra 2. Deputy Director, Vocational Education and Training, Regional Office, Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar 3. Industrial Training Institute Kalamnuri, Dist. Hingoli 2026:BHC-AUG:3667-DB (2) 966 WP-4275.2025 + 1.odt 4. Scheduled Tribe Certificate Verification Committee, Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar Respondents … Mr. O.D. Totawad, Advocate holding for Mr. Chandrakant Thorat, Advocate for the petitioners. Mr. N.B. Patil, A.G.P. for respondents-State. ... CORAM : SANDIPKUMAR C. MORE AND ABASAHEB D. SHINDE, JJ. DATED : 23 JANUARY 2026. Oral Judgment (Per Abasaheb D. Shinde, J.) : 1. Heard. 2. Rule. Rule is made returnable forthwith. With consent of the rival parties, writ petitions are taken up for final hearing at the stage of admission. 3. By these writ petitions, the petitioners, who are niece and uncle respectively, are challenging the common judgment and order dated 19.03.2025 passed by respondent / Scrutiny Committee by which tribe claims of the petitioners of belonging to “Mannervarlu” Scheduled Tribe, have been invalidated. 4. Learned counsel for the petitioners submits that the distant blood relatives namely Siddhant Sakharwad and Samarth Sakharwad of the petitioners, whose tribe claims were invalidated by the Scrutiny Committee, have challenged the said order before this Court by filing Writ Petition No.11596 of 2023 and this Court has allowed the said petition (3) 966 WP-4275.2025 + 1.odt partly by granting conditional validities to those petitioners subject to proposed reopening of the validities on the basis of which those petitioners have been granted conditional validities. He also submits that the genealogy filed before the Scrutiny Committee depicts the relationship of the petitioners with those validity holders and there is no dispute about the relationship. He, therefore, urged that the petitioners deserve to be granted conditional validities. 5. Per contra, learned A.G.P. submits that the Scrutiny Committee, after considering the fact that there are certain contra entries showing that the petitioners do not belong to “Mannervarlu” Scheduled Tribe as the old documents pertains to “Manner” caste, has invalidated the tribe claim of the petitioners. He, therefore, submits that since the petitioners have failed to establish their relationship with the validity holders as well as to substantiate that the petitioners belong to “Mannervarlu” Scheduled Tribe, they are not entitled for issuance of even conditional validities. 6. After having considered rival submissions advanced by learned counsel for the petitioners as well as learned AGP, we find that one Gangadhar Kishanrao Sakharwad is the original validity holder whose validity has been relied upon by this Court while granting conditional validities to the distant blood (4) 966 WP-4275.2025 + 1.odt relatives of the petitioners. This Court has also considered oldest documents of 1954 as well as 1956 of the forefathers showing that the petitioners therein belonged to “Mannervarlu” Scheduled Tribe. We therefore find that since relationship of the petitioners with those validity holders in Writ Petition No. 11596 of 2023 is not in dispute, we follow the same course and pass the following order. ORDER (i) The writ petitions are allowed. (ii) The impugned order dated 19.03.2025 passed by respondent No.4/Scrutiny Committee is hereby quashed and set aside. (iii) Respondent/Scrutiny Committee is directed to issue validity certificates to the petitioners of belonging to “Mannervarlu” Scheduled Tribe. (iv) The validity granted in favour of the petitioners will be co-terminus with the validity certificates of the blood relatives of the petitioners, whose tribe claims are proposed to be reopened. (ABASAHEB D. SHINDE) (SANDIPKUMAR C. MORE) JUDGE JUDGE VD_Dhirde