Two Dalit organisations on Wednesday filed a complaint against Narcotics Control Bureau officer Sameer Wankhede for allegedly using a fake caste certificate to secure a job, the Hindustan Times reported on Thursday. They urged Mumbai’s caste certificate authority to examine the officer’s document.
Wankhede, the zonal director of the Narcotics Control Bureau in Mumbai, is heading the investigation into the drugs case in which actor Shah Rukh Khan’s son Aryan Khan was arrested.
The Dalit groups – Bhim Army and Swabhimani Republican Paksh – sought an investigation into the caste certificate matter days after Nationalist Congress Party leader Nawab Malik accused Wankhede of fraud.
Malik had on October 25 tweeted what he claimed was a copy of Wankhede’s birth certificate, which said he was a Muslim. Wankhede’s father, Malik claimed, was born into a Dalit family, but married a Muslim woman, converted to Islam and took the name “Dawood”.
The Nationalist Congress Party leader alleged that Wankhede had produced a forged birth certificate to get his job under the Scheduled Caste category. “As per the law, Dalits who are converted to Islam do not get the quota,” Malik had said.
Malik had also tweeted a purported photo from Wankhede’s first marriage to a Muslim woman named Shabana Qureshi and shared their “nikah nama” or marriage certificate on Twitter. The certificate mentioned the groom’s name as “Sameer Dawood Wankhede”.
The Dalit groups that have filed the complaint against Wankhede said on Wednesday that the benefits the officer availed using his caste certificate must be immediately withdrawn if he is found guilty of forgery, the Hindustan Times reported
Manoj Sansare, a leader of the Swabhimani Republican Paksh, claimed that he had documents to show that Wankhede did not belong to a Scheduled Caste community, The Times of India reported.
“But he [Wankhede] still secured a job under the SC quota in the Indian Revenue Service, customs and central excise, in 2008,” Sansare added.
Ashok Kamble, the secretary general of Bhim Army, pointed out that Wankhede had got his caste certificate made in Mumbai, instead of Washim district, The Times of India reported.
“An SC caste certificate can be issued by the competent authority of the district where the ancestors of the concerned family are residing since 1950, hence, Wankhede’s father [Dnyandev Wankhede] made his caste validity certificate from Washim district in 2008, but in case of Sameer Wankhede, it was made in Mumbai,” he added.
Kamble said that Wankhede was a Muslim according to his birth certificate and had also got married under the Sharia law, The Times of India reported.
“It shows that right from his birth on December 14, 1979, Wankhede was a Muslim but made an SC caste certificate by misleading the competent authority,” Kamble alleged.
On Monday, Wankhede had submitted documents to the National Scheduled Castes Commission to prove that he belongs to the Dalit community. Vijay Sampla, the commission’s chairperson said Wankhede’s documents would be verified with the Maharashtra government.
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