1. This appeal is by the plaintiff a discharged Railway servant whose suit for damages for wrongful 'removal from the service', has been dismissed by the court below, and the only question is whether the plaintiff was removed from service by an authority subordinate to that by which he was appointed.

2. The plaintiff V.N. Rama Iyer entered service on 28.5.1921 as a temporary relieving clerk in the South Indian Railway Company. After probation for 3 months he was confirmed as a relieving clerk. He got his first appointment as a station Master on 13.3.1934 drawing Rs. 50 and was still in that cadre when the Government of India acquired the Railway as a going concern. That was on 1.4.1944. The plaintiff was subsequently promoted to Rs. 52 in the scale of Rs. 50-60 from 1.6.1946. On 4.6.1946 the plaintiff was transferred temporarily to the Ernakulam South Station, the post of the Station Master of which had been graded as Rs. 60-70 and he joined duty there on 18.4.1946. But soon thereafter he was asked to leave it and go to Lovedale, a hill station. The plaintiff was unwilling to leave Ernakulam and would not obey in spite of the insistent orders of the District Operating Su