HARI RAJ SINGH Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The short point involved in this petition filed under Art. 226 of the Constitution of India, is as' to whether the petitioner, who was holding the post of Assistant Secretary, Regional Transport Authority, Patiala, could be transferred to the Head Office by the State Transport Commissioner, Punjab, on administrative grounds or not.

(2.) Initially, the petitioner was appointed in the office of the State Transport Commissioner, Punjab, as a Clerk on 17th June 1957. Thereafter, he was promoted to the post of Assistant on 10th Jan., 1973. From the post of Assistant, he was provisionally promoted as Assistant Secretary, Regional Transport Authority, under rule 7 of the Punjab Transport Department (State Services Class III) Rules, 1963, by order dated 20th Nov., 1985. This promotion was later on regularised vide order dated 3rd July, 1986, with effect from the date the petitioner joined as Assistant Secretary, Regional Transport Authority. Patiala. On 5th May, 1989, at the time of general transfers of 37 officials of the Transport Department, the petitioner was also transferred to Head Office on administrative grounds. This transfer is being challenged by the petitioner mainly on the ground that he, having been promoted as Assistant Secretary, Regional Transport Authority, and having worked for about three years as such, had become a permanent and confirmed Assistant Secretary and had acquired an indefeasible right to retain that post, from which he could not be transferred to the Head Office. The second ground of attack against the order of transfer is that there are only three posts of Assistant Secretaries in the offices of the Regional Transport Authority at Jalandhar, Patiala and Ferozepur, and there being no post of Assistant Secretary in the Head Office, the transfer is wholly arbitrary.

(3.) In the written statement filed by Mr. K.C. Mahajan, State Transport Commissioner, Punjab, it has been pleaded that since the transfer order does not involve any punishment to the petitioner and more so, as the posts of Assistant Secretary, Regional Transport Authority Patiala and the Investigation Officer in the Head Office, are in the identical scale of pay and are in the same line of working, the transfer is legally in order. It has further been stated that by mere regularisation of his services as Assistant Secretary, the petitioner could not presume that he had been confirmed on completion of the period of probation. Moreover, since complaints of serious nature had been received against the petitioner, which were still being inquired into, the transfer of the petitioner had become an imperative necessity in the interest of administration. Further, the post of Investigation Officer on which the petitioner had been posted, used to be in a higher pay scale and was a promotional post for the incumbent of Assistant Secretary and now as a consequence of revision of pay scales on the recommendation of the Third Punjab pay Commission the maximum of the pay scale of the posts of Assistant Secretary and Investigation Officer (Head Office) had been equated. Hence, no loss whatsoever, financial or otherwise, had visited the petitioner as a consequence of his transfer from the post of Assistant Secretary (RTA) to that of Investigation Officer (Head Office).