A person can be treated as SC even after re-conversion: Supreme Court

The Supreme Court on 27 February 2015 held that a person can be accorded Scheduled Caste (SC) status even on re-conversion to Hinduism.
The status can be accorded if the person is accepted by people of his caste and he proves that before converting either he or his forefathers previously belonged to SC caste.
The ruling was given by two member Supreme Court bench of justices Dipak Misra and V Gopala Gowda on a plea of K P Manu, a Kerala resident, who had challenged the Kerala High Court verdict.
Supreme Court bench held that
Beneficiary person for the caste certificate are

• Absolute proof that he belongs to the caste that has been recognised by the Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Order, 1950.
• Converted to other religion from original religion to which the parents and earlier generations had belonged.
• There must be evidence establishing the acceptance by the community.

Background

• Petitioner K P Manu was born as a Christian. But his grandfather had embraced Christianity after leaving Hinduism. Petitioner later again became a Hindu and was C certificate of a Hindu caste, to which his ancestors belonged.
• Earlier, the scrutiny committee also had held that the petitioner cannot be treated as a Hindu on the grounds that his forefathers were Christians.
• Employer of the petitioner was directed to remove him from service and also to recover a sum of 15 lakh rupees towards the salary paid to him by the state government on the basis of the report of the scrutiny committee.
• Kerala High Court also had given the ruling in favour of scrutiny committee and against Petitioner.

Month: Current Affairs - February, 2015