Newly-appointed Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) corporator Prakash Patankar from Dadar submitted his son’s caste certificate instead of his own while filing the application form for the 2007 Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) election.
The information was obtained from BMC after Shiv Sena’s ex-corporator Pravin Devhare from the same ward, who was disqualified for allegedly submitting a false caste certificate, filed a right to information (RTI) application.
Patnakar was declared corporator in the first week of July after Devhare’s disqualification.
“Patankar in his affidavit has claimed that he belongs to the Bhandari caste, but as per the letter from the office of the collector and district magistrate Mumbai City submitted while filing application form, Patankar’s caste has been mentioned as Vaishyawani,” saidDevhare.
Patankar’s son’s caste certificate shows that his son belongs to the Vaishyawani caste which is recognised as Other Backward Class (OBC).
Devhare has also accused the scrutiny committee of BMC for negligence, as it did not reject Patankar’s application in spite of it giving wrong information regarding the caste.
“As per the documents from BMC, Patankar answered the question of whether he had submitted the attested copy of his caste certificate with the application form as “yes”. It was the scrutiny committee’s work to cross-check his answer,” said Devhare.
The disqualified Sena corporator from ward no.185 has sent a notice to the legal department and election officer of BMC. “We will fight till the Supreme Court if we don’t get justice. We demand re-election in the ward and strict action against Patankar for misinforming the court,” said Devhare.
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