JUDGMENT

VENKATARAMIAH, J.:— The appellant is a judicial officer of the State of Madhya Pradesh, who would have ordinarily retired on January 31, 1984 on attaining 58 years of age. He was appointed as a Munsiff-Magistrate in the erstwhile State of Bhopal in 1953. On reorganisation of States on November, 1, 1956, he became a member of the Judicial Service of the State of Madhya Pradesh. He was promoted as an Additional District & Sessions Judge on January 1974 and was confirmed in that post with effect from November 25, 1974. consequent upon the decision of the State Government to reorganise the Higher Judicial Service of the State of Madhya Pradesh in accordance with the advice of the High Court of Madhya Pradesh, 101 posts of the cadre of Additional District & Sessions Judges came to be abolished and the incumbents of those posts were to be absorbed as District & Sessions Judges as per Government Memorandum dated February 24, 1981. On the issue of the said Memorandum, the High Court of Madhya Pradesh decided to screen the officers in the cadre of Additional District & Sessions Judges for the purpose of making recommendation to the State Government about the promotion of, selected officers to the cadre of District & Sessions Judges. For this purpose, Full Court Meetings of the Madhya Pradesh High Court were held on February 27 and 28, 1981 and March 1, 1981. The case of the appellant was also considered in that connection. It is stated that at these meetings, the High Court first resolved to scrutinise the cases of all the judicial officers who were to attain the age of 55 years in the year, 1981. In the course of such scrutiny the High Court decided on February 27, 1981 to retire the appellant compulsorily on his attaining the age of 55 years under Rule 56 (3) of the Fundamental Rules. On March 1, 1981 it decided not to recommend him for promotion to the cadre of District & Sessions Judges. Accordingly, the State Government was addressed by the High Court. to retire the appellant compulsorily. The appellant thereafter continued as an Additional District & Sessions Judge until lie was served with the order of compulsory retirement dated August 28, 1981. Aggrieved by that order, the appellant filed a writ petition before the High Court. The petition was dismissed by a Division Bench of the High Court on July 29, 1982. This appeal is preferred by special leave against the judgment of the High Court.

2. Clause (a) of the Fundamental Rule 56 (3) as amended in 1976 which governs the case of the appellant reads thus :

"F. R. 56 (3) (a). A Government servant may, in the public interest, be retired at any time after he attains the age of fifty-five years without assigning any reason by giving him a notice in writing."

3. It is contended that the order of compulsory retirement is unsustainable on various grounds and the principal ground urged is that the High Court had made the recommendation to retire the appellant compulsorily without applying its mind to the case as required by law; that it was a decision based on collateral considerations and that it was arbitrary.

4. It is now firmly settled that the power to retire a Government servant compulsorily in public interest in terms of a service rule is absolute provided the authority concerned forms an opinion bona fide that it is necessary to pass such an order in public interest it is equally well settled that if such decision is based on collateral grounds or if the decision is arbitrary, it is liable to be interfered with by courts. (see Union of India v. J. N. Sinha (1971) 1 SCR 791. We have also gone through the following decisions, namely, Union of India v. M. E. Reddy (1980) 1 SCR 736: (AIR 1980 SC 563) . Swami Saran Saksena v. State of U. P. (1980) 1 SCR 923. Baldev Raj Chadha v. Union of India (1981) 1 SCR 430, Brij Bihari Lal Agarwal v. High Court of Madhya Pradesh (1981) 2 SCR 297  and D. Ramaswami v. State of Tamil Nadu (1982) 3 SCR 75 which have a bearing on the question befo