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Priya Pramod Gajbe vs The State of Maharashtra & Ors. (2023 INSC 663)

Civil Appeal · 2023 INSC 663Decided 11 Jul 2023
Civil Appeal No. 7117 of 2019
B.R. Gavai · J.B. Pardiwala · Pardiwala

Background

The appellant, a student who secured an MBBS seat in 2016-17 under the Scheduled Tribe quota by claiming to belong to the "Mana" tribe, had her caste claim invalidated by the Scrutiny Committee, a decision the Bombay High Court upheld. The invalidation rested on two grounds: she allegedly failed the "Affinity Test" (a vigilance-cell assessment of a candidate's knowledge of tribal customs and traditions), and she could not prove her family originally hailed from an area associated with the Mana tribe.

Decision Breakdown

Relying on its recent three-judge-bench ruling in Mah. Adiwasi Thakur Jamat Swarakshan Samiti, the Court held that pre-Constitutional documents (here, a 1924 birth record showing the caste as "Mana," with a later 1926 record showing a likely clerical variant, "Mani": a caste that does not even exist) carry the highest probative value and should not be discarded on flimsy grounds. It reiterated that the Affinity Test cannot be treated as a conclusive "litmus test," since modernisation and migration mean a genuine tribal candidate may no longer display traditional ethnological traits. It also found there was no area restriction attached to the "Mana" tribe entry in the Presidential Order for Maharashtra. On these findings, the Court quashed the Scrutiny Committee's and High Court's orders, declared the appellant validly belongs to the Mana Scheduled Tribe, and directed issuance of her validity certificate within one month.

Lesson Learnt

Genuine pre-Independence caste documents carry strong evidentiary weight in Scheduled Tribe claim disputes, and the Affinity Test, testing a candidate's familiarity with tribal customs, can only support, never single-handedly defeat, a claim otherwise backed by credible documentary proof.

Official source (sci.gov.in)View Judgment (PDF)

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