P.N. Ravindran, J.

The appellants are respondents 1 to 3 in W.P.(C)No.37894 of 2016, a writ petition filed by respondents 1 to 8 herein inter alia seeking a declaration that the insistence by the appellants on their employees opening savings bank accounts with the Industrial Development Bank of India (“IDBI” for short) for the purpose of disbursement of salary is unjust and illegal and violative of their fundamental rights. The brief facts of the case are as follows:

2. The writ petitioners, 8 in number, are employees of the Malabar Cancer Centre Society, Thalassery. Initially, the Malabar Cancer Centre Society was maintaining an account with Corporation Bank. Later, it opened an account with State Bank of India. When it felt that the State Bank of India was not offering services as expected by them, they opened an account with IDBI which started an extension counter and also provided an ATM facility in the campus. Later, on 12.6.2013, the managing committee of Malabar Cancer Centre Society requested its employees to open bank accounts with IDBI to facilitate payment of salary. It appears all employees except the petitioners opened bank accounts with IDBI. The petitioners refused to open an account with IDBI. All of them are however having accounts with State Bank of India, Thalassery Branch. This led to denial of salary and allowances to them with effect from August 2016. They thereupon filed W.P.(C) No. 37894 of 2016 in this court on 8.11.2016 seeking the following reliefs :

“i. To declare that the insistence for changing the bank accounts to the Thalassery Branch or any other Branch Industrial Development Bank of India (IDBI) for disbursing salary, is, unjust, illegal, arbitrary and violative of the Fundamental Rights of the petitioners.

ii. To issue a writ of certiorari quashing Exts. P3 to P10 as unjust, illegal, arbitrary and violative of the Fundamental Rights of the petitioners.

iii. To declare that circular No.3900/Circular/13/MCC dated 03.06.2013 is unjust, illegal and arbitrary.

v. To issue a writ of mandamus directing the respondents to disburse the pay and allowances including the festival allowances and leave surrender allowances from 1st August 2016 to the petitioners with immediate effect together with the interest at the rate of 12% per annum in either to respective State Bank of India, Thalassery Branch Accounts of the petitioners or in liquid cash directly to them.”

It is their contention that the employer cannot insist that they should open a bank account in a bank of the employer's choice to facilitate payment of salary and that they have the freedom to choose the bank in which they should open an account.

3. The appellants resisted the writ petition by filing a counter affidavit wherein the reasons which weighed with them to open a bank account with IDBI and to request the employees to open a salary account with IDBI are set out. The reasons thus set out in paragraph 6(A) to (E) of the counter affidavit are extracted below :

“(A) Inspite of repeated requests having been made by the Institute to the SBI Branch, the Bank refused to consider the proposal of the Institute to start an Extension Counter and an ATM in the Institute premises, even though all Official transactions of Malabar Cancer Centre (MCC) were being handled by the SBI. It is submitted that an Extension Counter of the Bank in the Institute was suggested because every day one staff from the Malabar Cancer Centre (MCC) had to carry huge amount of Cash to the Bank which is located 6 Kilometers from the Malabar Cancer Centre (MCC), for remittance. The above procedure involves a lot of risk and additional expenditure. It is submitted that an extension counter would have helped the staff to avoid to go to the State Bank of India for every transaction which lead to loss of manpower, and the same would adversely affect the smooth functioning of the Institution which is a Cancer Hospital.

(B) The request of the Institute to the SBI to waive the Demand