The Hyderabad High Court on Wednesday made it clear that it is a person's upbringing that must be taken into account while determining his/her caste if they are born to inter-caste parents.
It also said that officials from the revenue department are the competent authorities to ascertain the community where the child has been brought up. Once they certify the child's caste after verification process, it is not open for officials of universities and the social welfare department to question it while according seats in educational institutions, a bench of Justice V Ramasubramanian and Justice Anis said.
The bench said this in its judgment in a case filed by Sabbella Siri Manjoosha Reddy of Visakhapatnam district, whose scheduled caste (SC) certificate was questioned by the authorities of the NTR health university and the social welfare department. They refused to accord her an MBBS seat under the SC quota on the ground that her father is a Reddy. Though her mother is from scheduled caste, the daughter cannot claim reservation because her father is an upper caste person, they said, citing the judgement of the Supreme Court, delivered in 2012, in the Rameshbhai Dabhai Naika versus State of Gujarat case to support their claims.
However, Justice Ramasubramanian, who perused the records of the student and the cited judgement, concluded that the SC judgement was actually in favour of Siri Manjoosha. The judgement never said that the father's caste is the child's caste. It clearly said that the upbringing of the child is the crux.
Siri's mother filed an affidavit in the court saying that after her marriage, she stayed with her family and brought up her children in her village according to the customs and practices prevailing in the community. It is perhaps on the basis of this that the revenue authorities gave Siri Manjoosha the SC certificate, the bench said, adding that this cannot be ignored by the university.
It also said that officials from the revenue department are the competent authorities to ascertain the community where the child has been brought up. Once they certify the child's caste after verification process, it is not open for officials of universities and the social welfare department to question it while according seats in educational institutions, a bench of Justice V Ramasubramanian and Justice Anis said.
The bench said this in its judgment in a case filed by Sabbella Siri Manjoosha Reddy of Visakhapatnam district, whose scheduled caste (SC) certificate was questioned by the authorities of the NTR health university and the social welfare department. They refused to accord her an MBBS seat under the SC quota on the ground that her father is a Reddy. Though her mother is from scheduled caste, the daughter cannot claim reservation because her father is an upper caste person, they said, citing the judgement of the Supreme Court, delivered in 2012, in the Rameshbhai Dabhai Naika versus State of Gujarat case to support their claims.
However, Justice Ramasubramanian, who perused the records of the student and the cited judgement, concluded that the SC judgement was actually in favour of Siri Manjoosha. The judgement never said that the father's caste is the child's caste. It clearly said that the upbringing of the child is the crux.
Siri's mother filed an affidavit in the court saying that after her marriage, she stayed with her family and brought up her children in her village according to the customs and practices prevailing in the community. It is perhaps on the basis of this that the revenue authorities gave Siri Manjoosha the SC certificate, the bench said, adding that this cannot be ignored by the university.
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