Transfer guidelines create no enforceable right; interference requires mala fides or statutory violation.

The petitioner, an Assistant Manager in the Assam Gramin Vikash Bank, was appointed as an Office Assistant in 2013 and promoted to Officer, JMG Scale-I, in 2020.

Following her promotion, she was posted at Guwahati Branch and joined on 10.08.2020; she was subsequently transferred to the Guwahati Regional Office by order dated 29.04.2025 and joined there on 06.05.2025.

By a common transfer order dated 15.10.2025, eight officers/officials, including the petitioner, were transferred, and the petitioner was posted as Assistant Manager at Ganakpukhuri Branch under the Golaghat Region.

She challenged the transfer on the ground that it violated the Assam Gramin Vikash Bank Transfer Policy, 2025, particularly the provisions concerning transfers near the place where a female officer’s husband is stationed, the normal one-year minimum tenure, and the six-year regional tenure.

The Bank contended that the transfer was made by the competent authority due to administrative exigency, manpower shortage in the Golaghat Region, and the negative business parameters of Ganakpukhuri Branch.

Whether the petitioner’s transfer from the Guwahati Regional Office to Ganakpukhuri Branch violated Clause 4 of the Transfer Policy, which contemplates posting female officers near the station where their husbands or parents are stationed?

Whether the transfer was invalid because the petitioner had not completed one year at the Guwahati Regional Office or six years in a particular region, under Clauses 2 and 6 of the Transfer Policy?

Whether the transfer order warranted judicial interference on the ground of violation of the Transfer Policy, incompetence, mala fides, or violation of any statutory provision?

The Court applied the principle that transfer is an exigency of service and that an employee has no enforceable right to insist on a particular place of posting.

The Assam Gramin Vikash Bank Transfer Policy, 2025, including Clause 4 of the common guidelines, provides that female officers should, as far as possible, be transferred near the station where their husbands or parents are posted, subject to availability of vacancies and administrative convenience; Clauses 2 and 6 similarly regulate minimum tenure and regional posting but are not absolute mandates.

The Court relied on Punjab and Sind Bank v. Mrs. Durgesh Kuwar, (2020) 19 SCC 46, for the rule that judicial review ordinarily does not interfere with a transfer unless it is mala fide, contrary to a statutory provision, or issued by an incompetent authority.

It also relied on S.K. Nausad Rahaman v. Union of India, (2022) 12 SCC 1, holding that executive transfer policies, including spouse-posting policies, do not confer an indefeasible right to claim a particular posting and remain subject to administrative requirements.

The Court held that Clause 4 did not create an absolute right to remain posted at Guwahati merely because the petitioner’s husband worked there; the clause was expressly subject to vacancy and administrative convenience.

The petitioner had in any event remained posted in Guwahati since 2020—first at the Guwahati Branch and later at the Guwahati Regional Office—for approximately five years, and the Court declined to treat the change from the Branch to the Regional Office as an entirely separate tenure for the purpose of challenging the transfer.

The Bank had asserted administrative exigency, including surplus staff at Guwahati, manpower shortage in the Golaghat Region, and the operational needs of Ganakpukhuri Branch.

Accordingly, the one-year and six-year provisions were treated as administrative guidelines subject to the employer’s power to transfer officers for administrative reasons, rather than as enforceable rights.

Since the petitioner neither pleaded nor established mala fides, violation of a statutory provision, or action by an incompetent authority, mere alleged non-adherence to the Transfer Policy did not justify judicial interference.

However, the dismissal did not prevent the Bank from reconsidering the petitioner’s case under Clause 4 of the Transfer Policy; the petitioner was granted liberty to approach the competent authority afresh for such consideration.

The earlier interim order stood merged with the final order, and the writ petition was disposed of accordingly.