Judgment

V. BALAKRISHNA ERADI, J.:- This appeal preferred by special leave is against the judgment of a Division Bench of the Andhra Pradesh High Court setting aside the decision of a learned single Judge of that Court and dismissing a writ petition filed by the present appellant.

2. The appellant, who was working as an officer of the Forest Department in the State of Andhra Pradesh, approached the High Court challenging the provisional integrated gradation list of Forest Officers of the former Andhra and Hyderabad States published under the provisions of the States Reorganisation Act as annexure to a State Government order dated January 27, 1962. The contentions raised by the petitioner in the writ petition were mainly two-fold. Firstly, it was urged that the inter se seniority between the appellant and the 6th respondent, both of whom originally belonged to the Andhra Cadre, had been wrongly fixed in the provisional gradation list by showing the 6th respondent as senior to the appellant, whereas the appellant was legally entitled to seniority over the 6th respondent. Secondly, it was contended that respondents Nos. 3. 4, 5, 7 and 8, who were officers allotted to the State of Andhra