HC stays disqualification order against 7 Kolhapur corporators

The Bombay High Court today stayed an order that had disqualified seven corporators of Kolhapur Municipal Corporation (KMC), including Mayor Ashwini Ramane, as their caste certificates were rendered invalid.
The aggrieved corporators had moved the high court which stayed the order of disqualification. The stay was granted by a division bench of justices Prakash Naik and M S Karnik till June 20 when the matter would be heard again.
Of the seven corporators, four belong to Congress, two to BJP and one to NCP. The corporators are Mayor Ashwini Ramane, Nejdar Sandeep, Rusali Kadam, Deepa Makdoom (all Congress), Nilesh Desai (BJP), Santosh Gaikwad (both BJP) and Sachin Patil (NCP).

The corporators were disqualified after their caste certificates failed to clear the scrutiny of the state government's Caste Verification Committee.
Ramane, 22, had created history by becoming the youngest Mayor of KMC in November last year, trouncing the then sitting corporator and BJP candidate Savita Bhalkar.
Kolhapur Municipal Commissioner P Shivshankar had on May 3 submitted a 55-page report to the Secretary of the State Urban Development Department seeking action against 20 KMC corporators, including the Mayor, who were elected from the Scheduled Caste and other backward class categories in the civic election last year without submitting valid caste certificates.

The Caste Verification Committee subsequently invalidated their caste certificates on the basis of which they were disqualified as corporators.