Judgment

MITTER, J.:- The State of Mysore has come up in appeal from a common Judgment of the High Court at Bangalore disposing of a number of writ petitions and holding void the compulsory transfer of the respondents herein to the Agricultural University under the provisions of the University of Agricultural Sciences Act, 1963.

2. As the same question arises in all these appeals it will be sufficient to state the facts in Civil Appeal No. 1868 of 1969 in which one H. Papanna Gowda is the respondent. The said respondent was appointed on January 7, 1959 as an agricultural demonstrator in the Mysore Civil Service. His appointment was as a local candidate which under the Mysore Civil Service Rules means a person appointed not in accordance with the rules of recruitment. His services were however regularised when he was selected by the Public Service Commission for appointment to that post on August 27 1959. By an order dated April 4, 1964 he was transferred and posted as a Chemical Assistant of the Sugarcane Research Station Mandya, in the department of agriculture. When he was thus employed, a law made by the State Legislature called the University of Agricultural Sciences Act, 1963 (hereinafter referred to as the Act ) came into force on April 24, 1964. Before the High Court the respondents to these appeals challenged the vires of S. 7 (5) of the Act and a notification issued thereunder.

3. The preamble to the Act shows that it was an Act to establish and incorporate a University for the development of agriculture, animal husbandry and allied sciences in the State of Mysore. Under S. 3 (2) the University was to be a body corporate having perpetual succession and a common seal. The powers given under S. 6 of the Act enabled it inter alia to create administrative, ministerial and other posts and to appoint persons to such posts. Under Section 7 (1) subject to the conditions therein mentioned several agricultural and veterinary colleges were disaffiliated from the Karnatak University or the University of Mysore and were to be maintained by the new University as constituent colleges. The control and management of these colleges were to stand transferred to the Agricultural University and all its properties and assets and liabilities and obligations of the State Government in relation thereto were to stand transferred to, vest in, or devolve upon the said university. Under sub-section (4) of Section 7 the control and management of such research and educational institutions of the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Animal Husbandry and the Department of Fisheries of the State Government were, as and from such date as the State Government might by order specify, to be transferred to the University and thereupon all the properties and assets and liabilities and obligations of the State Government in relation to such institutions were to stand transferred to vest in, or devolve upon the University. Omitting the proviso which is not relevant for our purpose, sub-section (5) provided.

"Every person employed in any of the colleges specified in sub-section (1) or in any of the institutions referred to in sub-section (4) immediately before the appointed day or the date specified in the order under sub-section (4), 193 as the case may be, shall, as from the appointed day or the specified date, become an employee of the University on such terms and conditions as may be determined by the State Government in consultation with the Board :"

4. The Board has been defined in Section 2 clause (3) as the Board of Regents of the University.

5. By notification dated September 29, l965 the control and management of a large number of research and educational institutions were transferred to the University with effect from October 1, 1965. The Agricultural Research Institute, Mandya where the respondent was working was one such institution. Not liking the change which his future prospects were likely to undergo as a result of the notification, the r