The transfer policy is a policy of a welfare State and in the absence of any evident arbitrariness or a clause contrary to law, there is no scope to interfere with any clause of a transfer policy.

JUDGMENT :

SAURABH SHYAM SHAMSHERY, J.

1. In the present bunch of writ petitions, interpretation of clause 4 of a transfer policy for inter district and mutual transfer issued by a government order dated 02.06.2023 for teachers working in school run by Basic Shiksha Parishad is under consideration. The said clause is reproduced below:

^^tuin esa Lohd`r in ds lkis{k fnukad 30 vÁSy 2023 rd dk;Zjr v/;kidksa dh la[;k ds 10 Áfr'kr dh vf/kdre lhek rd vartZuinh; LFkkukarj.k fd;s tk;saxsA fdlh tuin ls LFkkukarfjr gksdj tkus rFkk vkus okys f'k{kd ,oa f'kf{kdk dh vf/kdre lhek 10 Áfr'kr gksxhA**

2. Sri H.N. Singh, Senior Advocate assisted by Sri Rishabh Srivastava, learned Advocate for petitioners along with S/Sri Seemant Singh, Rakesh Kumar Pandey, Manoj Kumar Singh, K.R. Singh, Sikhar Trivedi, Neeraj Shukla, Kamal Kumar Kesharwani, O.P.S. Rathore, Vibhu Rai, Navin Kumar Sharma, Pratik Chandra, Man Bahadur Singh, Vinod Kumar Singh, Sanjay Kumar Mishra, Shashi Kant Mishra, Prathamesh Upadhyay and Suresh Singh for petitioners have submitted that petitioners have been denied from consideration of their applications to transfer at desired district on the ground that there are no vacancy for incoming transfer. Crux of their argument is that interpretation and determination of calculation of 10% of vacancy and to declare zero vacancy for incoming transfer in certain districts is not only contrary to the object of transfer policy but based on incorrect interpretation of referred clause also.

3. Learned Senior Advocate has further submitted that in a district, if teachers are working more than sanctioned strength, they are also included for determination of 10% of posts available for transfer and accordingly, State has calculated that since there are already surplus teachers, therefore, there will be no incoming transfer but they have allowed outgoing transfer. In a way they have tried to accommodate illegal appointment above than sanctioned posts.

4. Above arguments have been opposed by Sri Shashi Prakash Singh, learned Additional Chief Standing Counsel along with S/Sri Ravi Prakash Srivastava and Manvendra Dixit, learned Standing Counsel for State and Ms. Archana Singh, learned counsel appearing for Board of Basic Education, U.P. at Allahabad and they have supported the calculation and stressed upon a word used in the above referred clause i.e. ^^tuin esa Lohd`r in ds lkis{k fnukad 30 vÁSy 2023 rd dk;Zjr v/;kidksa that both aspects have to be taken into consideration i.e. number of sanctioned posts and number of teachers working in a district and they have submitted that there is no infirmity in the calculation.

5. Before adverting to the rival submissions, for example the calculation in regard to primary rural School where in 11 districts, incoming transfer has been declared as zero is mentioned hereinafter:

S. No. District PRIMARY SCHOOL RURAL

Assistant Teacher 10% of Working at Incoming Outgoing

Sanction Working Vacant

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

1 BAGHPAT 1576 1640 -64 164 0 164

2 CHITRAKOOT 2181 2290 -109 229 0 229

3 G.B. NAGAR 1367 1424 -57 142 0 142

4 GHAZIABAD 890 1183 -293 118 0 118

5 HAPUR 1178 1200 -22 120 0 120

6 KANNAUJ 3054 3374 -320 337 0 337

7 KANPUR NAGAR 3081 3110 -29 311 0 311

8 LUCKNOW 2531 2677 -146 268 0 268

9 MAU 2670 2880 -210 288 0 288

10 MEERUT 2490 2505 -15 251 0 251

11 MUZAFFAR NAGAR 2509 2565 -56 257 0 257

6. It will be apposite to refer the law in regard to interference with policy decision of a State as held by this Court in a recent judgment in the case of Shraddha Yadav and Others vs. State of U.P. and Others, 2024 AHC 4085 and relevant paragraph from 15 to 20 are quoted below:

7. Learned Senior Advocate for petitioners has not disputed number of sanctioned posts viz-a-viz number of working teachers in above districts. The only dispute is that in a case where working strength is more than sanctioned strength, whether applications for incoming inter district transfer could not consider as it was declared ‘zero’ and whether permission was