Kavanur president’s certificates checked to confirm SC status

Ranipet: The district administration officials on Tuesday checked school certificates of a village panchayat president following complaints that he won the reserved local body post using forged documents.

Ranjit Kumar won the president’s post in Kavanur village panchayat (Arcot taluk, Timiri panchayat union) reserved for SC general category in the polls held in September last year. However, friction between the president and vice president Mekala Sampath in the panchayat resulted in posts on social media that Ranjit Kumar’s Class 5 certificate mentions him as a member of Hindu Kuravar in the caste category, which is an MBC, while his Class 10 certificate showed his caste to be Hindu Kuruvan, which put him in the SC category.

When the issue was taken to the notice of Collector Baskara Pandian, he ordered a field inspection following which officials spoke to 31 of Ranjit Kumar’s kin, who all concurred that he resided in the SC Arunthathiar Colony and was a member of the SC.

Official sources revealed that his Class 10 certificate stated that his caste was mentioned as SC Kuruvan and that the change was initiated by the then headmaster. Officials also accepted that “headmasters are not experts in labelling caste. They do not understand that a person’s caste could be altered by just changing one letter.” Needless to say, it has created a flutter in the district.