- (1.) THE petitioner is an officer in the service of the State Bank of India (hereafter the bank). He also happens to be the President of the State Bank of India Officers Association (Bengal Circle) (hereafter the Association).
(2.) BY filing this writ petition dated June 26, 2013, the petitioner has questioned an order dated June 12, 2013 passed by the Deputy General Manager (P.B.B.U.) of the bank conveying to him the decision of the appropriate authority to transfer him to the Kamarhati Branch of the bank as Manager (Br. Ops) under B & O Office, Bidhan Nagar. At the time of issuance of the impugned order of transfer, the petitioner was posted at the local head office of the bank at Kolkata in its PBBU Department. Mr. Majumder, learned Advocate for the petitioner, by referring to the pleadings in the writ petition has raised several points in support of his contention that the order of transfer ought to be interdicted. The points raised by him are: (i) the petitioner being an office -bearer of the Association is entitled to immunity from transfer in terms of the agreement entered into by and between the bank and the Association; (ii) the model transfer policy formulated by the bank envisages in clause 11 that a departure/deviation from the provisions of the policy must be approved by the Circle Management Committee but such approval has not been obtained in respect of the proposal to transfer the petitioner to Kamarhati branch; (iii) the order of transfer does not contain any reason and thus suffers from an incurable defect rendering it vulnerable on the authority of the Bench decision of this Court reported in 1982 (2) CHN 157 : Mukul Mitra v. Union of India and Ors.; (iv) the Chairman of the bank in November, 2012 gave a threat publicly tot take action against the office bearers of the Association in relation to an incident of demonstration (which allegedly lowered the image of the bank), pursuant whereto the petitioner and other office bearers of the Association were proceeded against departmentally and were also sought to be transferred in December, 2012 but such order was kept in abeyance, and now the petitioner once again is being sought to be transferred upon lifting of the abeyance order without any intelligible reason, and thus the order transferring him cannot be construed as one issued in public interest or administrative exigency; and (v) mala fide is the foundation of the impugned order of transfer.
(3.) MR . Majumder has accordingly prayed for admission of the writ petition and stay of operation of the impugned order of transfer.;