Is Sikh Jat OBC? HC relief to woman pradhan of reserved seat

Dehradun: Uttarakhand high court has granted interim protection to a Sikh Jat woman gram pradhan facing disqualification as her caste certificate was cancelled by the district caste panel after she was elected from a seat reserved for OBC candidates. HC gave the petitioner liberty to approach the state committee within a week and directed it to decide the matter on merit. Court ordered status quo of her position as gram pradhan until a remedy is availedBaljeet Kaur, a Sikh Jat and resident of Jaspur block in Udham Singh Nagar district, had contested the gram pradhan election in July last year from a seat reserved for Other Backward Classes (OBC) candidates and won. However, her caste certificate issued to her was cancelled by the district level caste scrutiny committee on Jan 1.Kaur challenged the committee's order in HC, contending that she belonged to the Jat community and was issued a caste certificate based on her caste which she acquired by birth. She said her caste status did not undergo any change after her marriage.While hearing her application, a bench of Justice Manoj Tiwari on Tuesday disposed of Kaur's petition and asked her to approach the state level caste scrutiny committee within a week while granting status quo of her position as gram pradhan until a remedy is availed.During the hearing, the counsel appearing for another contestant for post of gram pradhan, Jyoti Kumari, submitted that Kaur belonged to the Jat Sikh community, which was not recognised as OBC in Uttarakhand. He said the petitioner was born and brought up in Uttar Pradesh and became a resident of Uttarakhand after she got married here in 2013.Citing the judgment rendered by the Supreme Court in the Ranjana Kumari vs State of Uttarakhand & Others in 2012, the counsel said the order passed by the district level committee could not be faulted.The govt counsel also said the district committee's order was appealable before the state caste committee and the petitioner should have filed an appeal against the order instead of rushing to the high court.