The main legal point established is that transfer of employees between Municipal Corporations should be based on permissible administrative grounds and should not be interfered with unless exceptional grounds are made out.

JUDGMENT :

Sanjib Banerjee, J.

(Prayer: Appeal filed under Clause 15 of the Letters Patent against the order dated 10.9.2020 in W.P.No.7692 of 2020 passed by the learned Single Judge.)

The appeal arises out of an order dated September 10, 2020 by which the writ petitioner/respondents transfer from Avadi Municipal Corporation to Kancheepuram Municipality has been annulled.

2. There is no dispute that the writ petitioner was an employee of the erstwhile Avadi Municipality. The Municipality was thereafter converted into a Corporation and, in accordance with Section 9(6) of the applicable notification, all employees of the erstwhile Municipality were deemed to be employees of the Corporation. By an office memorandum of May 8, 2020, the writ petitioner was transferred and posted as Town Planning Officer in the Kancheepuram Municipality “on deputation basis due to administrative reason.” It is such memorandum of transfer that was challenged by way of the petition under Article 226 of the Constitution. In passing the judgment and order impugned, the learned Single Bench noticed the provisions of the Tamil Nadu Municipal Corporation Service Rules, 1996 and particularly a rule therein that recognised that for the purpose of appointment, promotion, reversion, transfer and discharge from service, each Municipal Corporation ought to be regarded as a separate unit. The learned Single Bench also referred to Rule 110 of the Tamil Nadu Fundamental Rules, 1922 which mandates as follows:

No Government servant may be transferred to foreign service against his will.”

3. The principal ground urged on behalf of the appellants herein before the Court of the first instance was the limited extent of the authority available to the employer under Section 116 of the Coimbatore City Municipal Corporation Act, 1981. The entire provision is set out in the impugned judgment and only the material part thereof may be noticed herein:

116. Power of Government to transfer officers and servants of the corporation or municipalities:-

Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act or in the Tamil Nadu District Municipalities Act 1920 (Tamil Nadu Act V of 1920), the Government shall have power -

(a) .....

(b) .....

(c) to transfer any Officer or servant of the Corporation to the service of any Municipality constituted under the Tamil Nadu District Municipalities Act, 1920 (Tamil Nadu Act V of 1920) or

(d) ......”

4. It is evident, on a plain reading of the aforesaid provision, that any officer or servant of any Corporation may be transferred to a Municipality and for such purpose the employer does not require the permission or the consent of the concerned officer or employee.

5. It appears that a case was made out before the learned Single Bench that the fourth respondent to the writ petition had been accommodated in the Municipality and, as a consequence, the writ petitioner had to be thrown out and parked in the municipality. It also appears that a completely unnecessary case was run in the affidavit filed by the State or the relevant Corporation to the effect that there were certain complaints against the writ petitioner, which necessitated the transfer of the writ petitioner from the Corporation to the Municipality. It is elementary that transfer cannot be used as a tool of oppression or punishment and it is only for the better administration of the functioning of the employer that a transfer may be effected.

6. The office memorandum of May 8, 2020 duly cited “administrative reason” as the ground for transfer. When an employer, even a government employer, cites administrative reasons for effecting a transfer and such transfer is otherwise not impermissible in law, such transfer is scarcely justiciable unless an egregious case of malice or hostile discrimination is made out. A mere allegation or a speculation that someone else had to be accommodated in the place of the transferred employee would not be such a ground that would excite a Court in exercise of its authority under A