Bengaluru: Minister of Law and Parliamentary Affairs J. C. Madhuswamy said on Tuesday March 22 that the State Government will not take lightly cases of upper caste people using fake caste certificates to get Scheduled Caste benefits.
“Such incidents will not be allowed by the government, which has issued a clear circular in this regard. I’ll urge the Social Welfare Department’s concerned secretary to look into it. The guilty, including officials responsible for providing false certifications, would face disciplinary action,” he said.
BJP MLAs P. Rajiv, M. P. Kumaraswamy and N Mahesh, and JD (S)’s Dr. K. Annadani raised the issue and expressed concern that no one has been punished for claiming SC benefits using fake documents.
Madhuswamy said that ‘beda jangama’ or ‘budga jangama’ was included in the SC list of 101 castes in 1997, against serial number 19. However, some people have obtained false certificates despite not belonging to that caste.