Patna High Court
Dr. Devendra Singh vs Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central ... on 20 May, 2022
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA
Civil Writ Jurisdiction Case No.20821 of 2021
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Dr. Devendra Singh, son of Late Seo Murat Singh, Resident of Kurthiya, P.S.
Baburi, District-Chandauli (Utter Pradesh), at residing at Quarter No. New
C1-47, RPCAU Campus, Pusa, Samastipur.
... ... Petitioner/s
Versus
1. Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agriculture University, Pusa, Samastipur
through its Registrar.
2. The Registrar, Central Agriculture University, Pusa, Samastipur, Bihar.
3. The Vice-Chancellor, Central Agriculture University, Pusa, Samastipur,
Bihar.
4. Dr. Ramesh Chandra Srivastava, name of father not known to the petitioner,
presently functioning as Vice Chancellor, Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central
Agriculture University, Pusa, Samastipur, Bihar.
5. The Deputy Registrar (Estt.), Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agriculture
University, Pusa, Samastipur, Bihar.
6. Dr. Harendra Singh, father not named to the petitioner, Professor,
Department of Agronomy, Post Graduate College of Agriculture, Dr.
Rajendra Prasad Central Agriculture University, Pusa, Samastipur.
... ... Respondent/s
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Appearance :
For the Petitioner/s : Mr.Saroj Kumar
For the Respondent/s : Mr.Chandra Mohan Singh
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CORAM: HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE SANJEEV PRAKASH
SHARMA
CAV JUDGMENT
Date : 20-05-2022
The brief fact which have come on record is that the petitioner was
promoted as Professor, Agronomy, in Rajendra Agriculture
University, Pusa, Samastipur, on 27 July, 2006. After coming into
force of Bihar Agriculture University Act, 2010, Dr. Rajendra
Prasad, Central Agriculture University Act, 2016, was enacted. As
Patna High Court CWJC No.20821 of 2021 dt. 20-05-2022
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per Section 3(t) of the Act, 2016, the visitors are defined and
Section 44 of the Act provides that the first Chancellor and first
Vice-Chancellor shall be appointed by the visitors for five years.
Section 45 of the Act repealed the Bihar Agriculture University
Act, 1987 and further provided all the grants and awards shall be
deemed to be provided by Dr. Rajendra Prasad, Central
Agriculture University. After formation of the Central University
petitioner was posted as Dean-cum-Principal, Tirhut College of
Agriculture, Dholi, apart from holding the post of Director, Seed
and Farm, vide order dated 05.07.2017. By order dated
07.12.2018he was posted as Professor, Department of Agronomy, with the University. He was further nominated as the Head of the Department of Agronomy along with his original posting of Professor-cum-Chief Scientist, Agronomy, at the University vide order dated 11.09.2020.
2. The petitioner has by way of the writ petition challenged the order whereby he has been transferred to Pandit Deendeyal Upadhayay College of Horticulture and Forestry, Pipra Kothi, East Champaran, vide order dated 08.12.2021.
3. Learned counsel for the petitioner submits that the post of Head of the Department is for a period of five years in terms of Section 10(5) of the Act, 2016. He submits that the Patna High Court CWJC No.20821 of 2021 dt. 20-05-2022 3/10 transfer order is wholly illegal and unauthorized inasmuch as the place where the petitioner has been transferred is an under graduate college and suffers from malice in law as the status of the petitioner has been reduced and he has been demoted from a post graduate institution to an under graduate institution and posted against a post of Assistant Professor. It is stated that there is no sanctioned post of Professor, Agronomy, at Pandit Deendeyal Upadhayay College of Horticulture and Forestry, Pipra Kothi, East Champaran. Learned counsel took the Court to the sanctioned post available under the Act in order to show that in the college where the petitioner has been posted there is a recommendation of three posts of Professor, ten posts of Associate Professor and thirty posts of Assistant Professor, no post has been sanctioned. It is submitted that three years time of Head of the Department has not yet been completed and the petitioner has been transferred. It is further stated that by another order respondent no. 6 who is junior to the petitioner as he was promoted as Professor on 26.11.2007. His transfer is alleged to be illegal also on the ground that the petitioner is a getting research scholars and as also in the midst to a project on "Development of Zero Budget, Natural, Organic and intensive integrated farming system models to empower to rural youth through skill development". Learned counsel submits that Patna High Court CWJC No.20821 of 2021 dt. 20-05-2022 4/10 the action has been taken on account of malice and biased approach of the Vice-Chancellor as against him who was to harass the petitioner. The respondent no. 4 has a personal enmity and he has harassed not only the petitioner but his son-in-law who has also been transferred by the Vice-Chancellor from Tirhut College of Agriculture, Dholi, to a Project at West Champaran and mere a vindictive approach is against him.
4. The respondents have filed there reply and it is stated that during pendency of the writ petition the order was passed whereby the petitioner was relieved from the post of Professor of Head of the Department, Pusa, with effect from 31.12.2021. It has been further stated that the additional affidavit filed by the petitioner that the Vice-Chancellor was having a personal prejudice and the Vice-Chancellor had an impression that the petitioner was behind a PIL filed in the High Court wherein allegations were levelled against the Vice-Chancellor and respondent no. 4 by making illegal large scale appointment and committing financial irregularity. The writ petition was allowed to be withdrawn with liberty to raise objections before the competent authority. However, the petitioner was nowhere involved in the said proceedings.
Patna High Court CWJC No.20821 of 2021 dt. 20-05-2022 5/10
5. Reply has been filed on behalf of the University and it has been stated that after the conversion of the Rajendra Agriculture University into Dr. Rajendra Prasad, Central Agriculture University, the Vice-Chancellor took over on 22 nd June, 2017 as the first regular Vice-Chancellor. The petitioner was transferred to run the newly established Pandit Deendeyal Upadhayay College of Horticulture and Forestry, Pipra Kothi, East Champaran, in the interest of teaching problem of college and as regards the service of petitioner for three years as Head of the Department it has been stated that if the need is required the petitioner would be declared Head of the Department of Pandit Deendeyal Upadhayay College of Horticulture and Forestry, Pipra Kothi, East Champaran. It is stated that the petitioner is holding the post of Assistant Professor and has got promotion to the post of Professor and University Professor under the career advancement scheme and thus he can be posted against the post of Assistant Professor and he can not be said to be holding a substantive post of Professor. It is stated that accordingly he has been transferred to a post of Assistant Professor which shall be treated as upgraded as Professor till he holds such post.
6. Counsel for the respondents also pointed out that the period of the Vice-Chancellor functioning with the Central Patna High Court CWJC No.20821 of 2021 dt. 20-05-2022 6/10 Agriculture University has also been regularized and the existing Vice-Chancellor of Rajendra Agriculture University was allowed to continue to hold the charge of Vice-Chancellor of the Dr. Rajendra Prasad, Central Agriculture University.
7. Learned counsel for the petitioner submits that the order is wholly illegal and forces a Professor of Agronomy to work on a much lower post of Assistant Professor. The petitioner has been relegated to a much lower post which amounts to reversion. It is further submitted that there a large number of Assistant Professor, Agronomy available in the University and they could have been transferred to Pandit Deendeyal Upadhayay College of Horticulture and Forestry, Pipra Kothi, East Champaran, to teach the subject of Agronomy under the graduate level. Further it is submitted that the respondent has been working as Vice- Chancellor since 22nd January, 2016 and has already completed more than five years of service and it is a case of harassment and mental torture, a person junior to the petitioner has been posted in his place.
8. Learned counsel has taken this Court to the document showing number of Assistant Professors in the Department. It is submitted that the power was not existing in the Vice-Chancellor who had completed his five years tenure to transfer the petitioner Patna High Court CWJC No.20821 of 2021 dt. 20-05-2022 7/10 and secondly even if it is exercised even it was available the same has been exercised is a colourable exercise of power and with ulterior motive and considerations and has therefore prayed that the order dated 08.12.2011 whereby the petitioner was transferred and the order dated 09.12.2021 whereby he was relieved be set aside the quashed and the petitioner be allowed to continue on the post of Professor and Head of the Department of Agronomy. The Court passed an order initially directing the petitioner to join his new place of posting but the same was made to subject to final outcome of the writ petition. The question arises where such a transfer can be said to be legal, justified and passed for administrative reason.
9. In the opinion of this Court, in ordinary course of administration a person can be transferred if there is an administrative exigency on a post of equal status. Learned counsel for the petitioner has also pointed out that the petitioner had challenged the continuance of Vice-Chancellor after he had completed five hears tenure making a representation to the Chancellor pointing out that since the period was over the Vice- Chancellor was a usurper on the post. The said word usurper has been treated as derogatory and a departmental enquiry has been proposed against the petitioner which shows that the Vice- Patna High Court CWJC No.20821 of 2021 dt. 20-05-2022 8/10 Chancellor had personal malice against the petitioner. Learned counsel submits that as the period of working as Vice-Chancellor has been regularized from 26.11.2016 to 20.06.2017, service period of five years and in terms of Section 44 of the Act on 25 th July, 2021, Dr. Ramesh Chandra Srivastava, respondent no. 4, could not have been worked after five years. The order passed by him after the said period is therefore wholly wrongful.
10. The Supreme Court in (2009) 2 SCC, 592 (Somesh Tiwari Vrs. Union of India & Ors.) held as under :
Indisputably an order of transfer is an administrative order. There cannot be any doubt whatsoever that transfer, which is ordinarily an incident of service should not be interfered with, save in cases where inter alia mala fide on the part of the authority is proved. Mala fide is of two kinds - one malice in fact and the second malice in law. The order in question would attract the principle of malice in law as it was not based on any factor germane for passing an order of transfer and based on an irrelevant ground i.e. on the allegations made against the appellant in the anonymous complaint. It is one thing to say that the employer is entitled to pass an order of transfer in administrative exigencies but it is another thing to say that the order of transfer is passed by way of or in lieu of punishment. When an order of transfer is Patna High Court CWJC No.20821 of 2021 dt. 20-05-2022 9/10 passed in lieu of punishment, the same is liable to be set aside being wholly illegal.
11. In the aforesaid background the present case where the petitioner has been transferred to a much lower post of Assistant Professor while he was earlier holding the post of Head of the Department is an act lowering the status of the petitioner. In State of U.P. & Ors. Vrs. Sughar Singh (1974 1 SCC, 218 reversion was explained. In 1969 2 SCC 158 (Deewan Singh Vrs. Champat Singh & Ors.) the Supreme Court held that a person posted on a lower post amounts to lowering down his status which is also one kind of reversion.
12. Thus, for one above this Court is satisfied that the petitioner while being transferred, to a lower post has been subjected to reversion, the action suffers from malice in law as well as notice on fact and is vitiated. More so, as there were other Assistant Professors available with the University for being posted in the College against the post available therein there cannot be any administrative exigency attached. The senior most Professor of the University could not have been posted on a lower post of Assistant Professor on ground of the administrative exigency. Posting another person on the post of Head of the Department, Agronomy who is junior to the petitioner before petitioner's tenure was completed, also reflects the mala fide approach of the Vice-
Patna High Court CWJC No.20821 of 2021 dt. 20-05-2022 10/10 Chancellor against whom admittedly the petitioner has taken-up cudgels alleging that the Vice-Chancellor was an usurper on the post as he has already completed his five years tenure which was taken as an affront by issuing show cause to the petitioner.
13. In view thereof keeping in view the law laid down by the Apex Court (supra), the writ petition deserves to be allowed. The order dated 08,12,2021 is quashed and set aside. The respondents are directed to reinstate the petitioner on the post of Head of the Department, Agronomy, with all consequential benefits and he shall be allowed to continue till his tenure is completed.
(Sanjeev Prakash Sharma, J) Shamshad/-
AFR/NAFR AFR CAV DATE 11.04.2022 Uploading Date 31.05.2022 Transmission Date NA