A transfer of an officer from one post to another does not amount to a reduction in rank if the pay, emoluments, and grading of the officer remain the same.

( 1 ) THIS appeal arises out of a writ petition for mandamus under Art. 226 of the Constitution.

( 2 ) THE appellant was a District and Sessions Judge in the former Bikaner State. He was appointed on 29-1-1948, in the grade of Rs. 500-40-700 and worked as such till 7-4-1949.

( 3 ) ON that date a new State of Rajasthan was formed by the integration of a number so States (including the former State of Bikaner) by means of a Covenant signed by the High Contracting Parties.

( 4 ) ARTICLE XVI (1) of the Covenant ran thus:"the United State hereby guarantees either the continuance in service of the permanent members of the public service of the former Rajasthan State and of each of the new Covenanting States on conditions which will not be less advantageous than those on which they were serving on 1-11-1948 or the payment of reasonable compensation or retirement on proportionate pension. "

( 5 ) THE integration necessarily involved a reorganisation of the various services in the several integrating States. On the judicial side it was found that there were as any as twenty eight Courts of District and Sessions Judges in the aggregate. In the integrated State it was proposed to have only fifteen. The reorganisation took time and in the interval certain interim arrangements had to be made. These arrangements are set out in a Rajasthan Gazette Notification dated 25-5-1950. We append the relevant extracts:"4. In Appendix F. . . . have been indicated the provisional positing on an ad hoc basis of the posts specified in Appendices A to E.

( 6 ) ALL the appointments mentioned in the different Appendices, attached to this Order, are provisional. The emoluments of none or these officers appointed are being affected and they will continue to draw their existing salaries until further orders. All the appointments are without prejudice to the creation of a Judicial Service in Rajasthan to be formed in accordance with the rules which may be made therefor. "appendix F is headed-"ad hoc postings of Judicial Officers to Civil and Sessions Courts. "the appellant was appointed under this heading in Part II as a civil and Additional Sessions Judge in the Jaipur Division. 6. But before this Notification was made, namely on 9-12-1949, the appellant received the following order from the new Rajasthan Government:"shri Amar Singh, District and Sessions Judge, Churn, is transferred to Ganganagar as District and Sessions Judge, Ganganagar. " Among other contentions, the appellant relies on this as an election by the new Government to continue him in his original post and contends that it could not later change its mind and make his service provisional as it purported to do in the notification just cited.

( 7 ) TWO months after the notification, namely on 31-7-1950, the appellant's increment became due and Government sanctioned it in the following terms:"sanction is accorded to the grant of a stipulated increment of Rs. 40 p. m. , in the scale of Rs. 500-40-700 to Shri Rajvi Amar Singh, District and Sessions Judge in Bikaner Division, with effect from 23-3-1950, thereby raising his salary from Rs. 540 to Rs. 580 p. m. "

( 8 ) WHEN the final re-organisation was brought into force and the twenty eight Courts of District and Sessions Judges reduced to fifteen, the appellant was posted as Civil and Additional Sessions Judge on an ad hoc basis on 25-5-1950

( 9 ) ON 11-9-1950, the appellant made a representation to the Government of Rajasthan against his posting of 25-5-1950, as an ad hoc Civil and Additional Sessions Judge. He says in his writ petition to the High Court that-"he was given to understand that these ad hoc postings were without prejudice to the claims of the Government servants for a suitable position in the integrated set up on permanent basis. "this allegation was admitted by the opposite party.

( 10 ) LATER, he was appointed substantively as Civil Judge on 23-4-1951. He was placed in Group C (Civil Judges and Munsiffs) and placed at No. 18 in t