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| Doubts on BJP Samba candidate’s claims | | | EARLY TIMES REPORT
Jammu, Dec 4: Bhartiya Janta Party is up for an upsetting jolt in one of the constituencies as nomination claims of one of its candidates in a key constituency have come under questioning and may even be cancelled.
The Returning Officer has reserved for consideration nomination papers of Satwant Kaur Dogra, BJP candidate from Samba constituency. Samba is a reserved constituency for Scheduled Castes while written complaint has been filed before the Returning Officer of Samba Constituency that Satwant Kaur Dogra is not a bonafide Scheduled Caste candidate and she has allegedly filed her claims on unsustainable basis.
However, when contacted the Deputy Commissioner Samba, Saurabh Bhagat, who is also the District Election Officer, told EARLY TIMES that complaints have been received against Dogra but she has been able to give evidence against her caste claims. He said that those who leveled allegations against her were not able to substantiate their allegations with evidence.
It is learnt that the BJP candidate is actually not a Scheduled Caste as she is from Other Backward Classes. She is however married to a Scheduled Caste. On the basis of her marriage to a Scheduled Caste, the BJP candidate is reported to have procured an SC certificate. The law clearly says that upon marriage to a man a different community the caste of the woman does not change even though their children can avail the certificate of caste of their father. Few years back such a case had come from an assembly constituency in Andhra Pradesh where the State High Court had settled this point which was later upheld by the apex court also.
Since no candidate other than an SC is allowed to form nomination papers from a constituency reserved for the community, a complaint was received in the office of Returning Officer of Samba constituency that Satwant Kaur Dogra is not a Scheduled Caste by birth. Dogra was not available for comments but sources close to her said that complaints filed against her had no basis.
Today was the date of scrutiny of nomination of papers as the last date of filing nomination papers is already over. Samba district, along with Jammu, is going to polls in last phase on December 24. |
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