By Damayantee Dhar
The 22-year-old Afroz was declared the winner in the local sarpanch polls held in June this year, but even as she prepared to take office, the Mehsana Municipal Corporation (MMC) had initiated steps to disqualify her.
Talking to The Federal, Afrozbani Sipai said, “I had mistakenly written my date of birth as January 7, 2005 and that became an issue when the Collector was making a list of all the winning sarpanches of Mehsana to be felicitated by the Gujarat CM Bhupendra Patel in an event. However, the office of the taluka development officer (TDO) did not inform me and directly initiated the disqualification process. As per the rules, the TDO is supposed to send a notice in case of any discrepancy in the nominee or winner’s form.”
Afrozbanu learned of her disqualification only after it had been officially declared.
Not giving up
Further, Afrozbanu shared that her father sought her correct birth certificate that showed her birth date as September 3, 2003, which made her 22 years old at the time of the poll. “But the civic body by then had handed over the disqualification notice to us by on July 28 and Hirenbhai Chaudhary, the runner up of the gram panchayat election was declared the sarpanch of Gilosan. I was told nothing could be done now.”
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Afrozbanu, however, did not want to give up without a fight. “That’s when I decided to file the legal case,” she said.
Justice delivered
She filed a case in the Gujarat High Court challenging the MMC’s order in August 2025. On October 19 this year, the High Court quashed the civic body’s decision and reinstated Afrozbanu as the sarpanch of Gilosan.
This story was originally published in thefederal.com. Read the full story here.