A permanent employee cannot be posted on deputation without his/her consent to some other department.

Samapti Chatterjee, J.

1. The following issue is to be determined :

(a) Whether a permanent employee can be posted on deputation without his/her consent to some other department?

2. The case of the petitioner in nutshell is as follows :

On 30th June, 1994 petitioner was initially appointed on compassionate ground after the death of her husband as a Junior Clerk in Basumati Corporation Limited at Siliguri and was thereafter posted at Kolkata Head Office. On 29th September, 2014 Principal Secretary Information and Cultural Affairs Department Government of West Bengal issued the impugned order of transfer on deputation thereby directing the petitioner to carry out her work on deputation basis under the department of Information and Cultural Affairs Department, Nabanna.

On 9th October, 2014 the Managing Director of the Basumati Corporation Ltd. issued the impugned release order thereby directing the petitioner to join Information and Cultural Affairs Department, Government of West Bengal. It was also mentioned in the said impugned order that petitioner will draw salaries from original place of posting i.e. from the said corporation.

Feeling aggrieved by the impugned order the petitioner filed the present writ petition.

3. Mr. Srijib Chakraborty, learned Advocate appearing for the petitioner submitted that as per the service jurisprudence petitioner is liable to be transferred from one department to other department to the same post but the petitioner was never appointed in the department of Information and Cultural Affairs. Petitioner was appointed under Basumati Corporation Ltd on compassionate ground. Thereafter she was transferred to Siliguri Branch and again from Siliguri she was taken to head office at Kolkata. Therefore, in any event petitioner shall not be directed to join on deputation to a completely separate establishment without her consent.

4. Mr. Chakraborty further vehemently contended that when the petitioner was taken to Siliguri Branch of the said Corporation petitioner had given consent but in the present case without obtaining any consent from the petitioner the authority illegally, whimsically and arbitrarily directed the petitioner to perform her duty on deputation under Information and Cultural Affairs Department. The petitioner is no way related to that department. The petitioner’s nature of work is also not related to that department. In support of his contention Mr. Chakraborty relied on a Hon’ble Court decision reported in 1982 (2) CHN Page380 Paragraphs-8, 17 and 22 (Sri. Ranjit Basu vs State of West Bengal & Ors) where the Hon’ble Court held that sending an incumbent from his parent department to some separate department on deputation without obtaining consent from the said incumbent is bad in law. Paragraph-17 of the decision is quoted below :

“Para-17- The general principles that can be deduced from the decisions and the provisions and the rules are, that an employee (1) cannot be transferred out of his cadre or establishment against his wish; (2) when appointment is made to a specified post or a specified group of posts, no transfer can be justified merely because the pay is not being affected, (3) the government servant cannot be asked to perform duties which were never expected of him when he was recruited and (4) expectations of future promotions cannot be wiped off by moving a government servant around. A cadre is the strength of a service or part of a service sanctioned as a separate unit. The Assembly Secretariat staff clearly form such a separate unit even if it is assumed or presumed that they form part of the West Bengal General Service. The petitioner’s appointment was as a Bengali Reporter there. He was not recruited as a member of the West Bengal General Service and then given a post in the service. His special qualification for the post, it was submitted, a news reporter was not the same thing as a Bengali Reporter of the Assembly Secretariat. The order of the Speaker cannot be describe