SHREE CHANDRASHEKHAR,J. - (1.) On a plea that the District Superintendent of Education-cum-District Project Officer, Jharkhand Education Council, Palamau has no jurisdiction to issue impugned letter of transfer issued on 04.03.2017 the petitioners seek to challenge legality of the said order on the ground that only the State Project Director is the competent authority to pass an order of transfer.
(2.) Mr. Indrajit Sinha, the learned counsel for the petitioners referring to Rule2 of the Bihar Education Project Service Regulations (as adopted by the State of Jharkhand) submits that the Regulations are applicable to an employee appointed on contract basis also. The main plea of the petitioners is founded on Regulation 47 which reads as under:- 47. "Transfer :No employee of the Parishad may ordinarily be transferred from one place to another, provided that in exceptional and unavoidable circumstances the State Project Director may transfer an employee."
(3.) A bare reading of the aforesaid provision would disclose that it is not the State Project Director who is the authority to order transfer rather, when one reads Regulation 3(vi) along with the appointment letter dated 05.10.2006, it would become apparent that the appointing authority, who in the case of the petitioners is District Superintendent of Education, would be the competent authority to pass an order of transfer of the petitioners. Only in exceptional and unavoidable circumstances power to order transfer is vested with the State Project Director. Information revealed through RTI would disclose that the petitioners have not been transferred. Even if it is assumed that letter dated 04.03.2017 is an order of transfer they have been send to other places only for executing work under the Project. It is admitted at Bar that the petitioners have been transferred within the district and within a distance is only few kilometers. Petitioners are not staying at the place were presently they are posted, a fact which would be revealed when one reads address of the petitioners in the memo of parties and the place of their previous postings.;