Authorities Must Consider Invited Transfer Preferences Where Preferred Posts Remain Vacant

The petitioner, a Touring Veterinary Officer (Mobile) posted at Aurangabad, had served there for more than three years.

The Department invited employees to submit five preferred transfer postings. The petitioner selected posts in Jehanabad, Nawada, Rohtas and Patna, but the transfer order dated 28 June 2026 posted him to Gopalganj.

He contended that three posts among his choices remained vacant; the respondents did not deny the vacancies, but argued that they did not give him a legal right to a preferred posting.

The petitioner sought to have the transfer order set aside and to be posted to one of his selected locations.

1. Whether the petitioner’s transfer to Gopalganj should be set aside because it did not accord with the options he had submitted under the Department’s invitation.

2. Whether the Department should be directed to consider the petitioner’s options in light of the unchallenged assertion that three preferred posts remained vacant.

Transfer is an incidence of service, and an employee has no legal right to be transferred or posted to a particular place. Judicial review of routine transfer orders under Article 226 of the Constitution is limited.

However, where the Department has invited employees to state their posting preferences, the decision-maker must consider the submitted options; the Court held that the Department could not simply ignore them while accepting that vacancies existed at some of the selected locations.

The respondents cited Shilpi Bose v. State of Bihar & Ors., AIR 1991 SC 532, and S.C. Saxena v. Union of India & Ors., (2006) 9 SCC 583, in support of the limited scope of review in transfer matters.

The Court accepted that it could not interfere merely because the petitioner preferred a different posting and that the transfer order would not be quashed.

But the Department had invited five choices, the petitioner had submitted them, and the respondents did not dispute that three selected posts were vacant. In those circumstances, the Department was required to consider the petitioner’s options rather than disregard them without consideration.

The appropriate relief was therefore a direction to decide a fresh representation, not an order directly assigning the petitioner to a chosen post.

It directed the petitioner to submit a fresh representation to the Secretary of the Department within four weeks, and directed the Secretary to decide it within four weeks of receipt, taking into account the Department’s letter inviting posting options and the choices submitted by the petitioner. If the representation is rejected, a reasoned order must be communicated to him forthwith.

The writ application was disposed of accordingly.