NARAYANA PAI, CJ. ( 1 ) THE petitioners in these cases were appointed under the provisions of the Bombay Village Panchayat Act of 1933 as Secretaries of various Panchayats functioning under the said Act and continue to serve as such secretaries of the Panchayats to which they had been respectively appointed. By the order made by the Deputy Commissioner of the relevant District in each of these cases, the petitioner therein was sought to be transferred from the Panchayat of which he was serving as Secretary, to another Panchayat to serve that other Panchayat as Secretary. The Petitioners impugn the validity of the said orders of transfer. ( 2 ) TWO principal reasons are stated in support of the prayers to quash the said orders of transfer, viz. , (1) that the petitioners are governed by the bombay Village Panchayats Secretaries (Conditions of Service) Rules, 1948 framed under the Bombay Village Panchayats Act, 1933 and that Rule 23 thereof requires that services of Secretaries of Panchayats may be transferred from one Panchayat to another only with the consent of the secretary concerned and the consent of the Panchayat to which he is sought to be transferred, and (2) that, in any event, the petitioners not being Government servants are not liable to be transferred as if they are such Government servants. ( 3 ) IT is common ground that in the light of the provisions of S. 221 of the Mysore Village Panchayats and Local Boards Act, 1959, the State government have promulgated in March 1962 what are called the Mysore local Government Service (Panchayat Secretaries Branch) (Cadre and recuitment) Rules 1962. As originally framed these rules contained only 17 rules. By an amendment made in July 1967, a new rule No. 18 was added thereto. The said rule reads:"18. The Bombay Village Panchayat (Panchayat Secretaries) conditions of Service) Rules 1948, and other rules corresponding to any of the aforesaid Rr. 2 to 17 made under any enactment or law repealed by the Mysore Village Panchayats and Local Boards Act 1959, are hereby repealed. " ( 4 ) IT should be mentioned that the repeal of various Acts including the Bombay Village Panchayats Act by sub-sec. 2 to 17 made under any enactment or law repealed by the Mysore Village Panchayats and Local Boards Act 1959, are hereby repealed. " ( 4 ) IT should be mentioned that the repeal of various Acts including the Bombay Village Panchayats Act by sub-sec. (1) of S. 242 of the Mysore village Panchayats and Local Boards Act, 1959, is subject to various provisos, according to one of which any rules made or issued under the repealed Acts are to continue to be in force unless and until superseded by any action taken under the Act. Unless, therefore, the Bombay Rules are superseded or repealed they must be held to continue to be in force and govern the persons and situations sought to be governed by the same. One of the arguments addressed on behalf of the petitioners was that rule 18 of the Mysore Rules mentioned above repeals only the first 17 rules of the Bombay Rules. The language of the rule however does not support this contention. It expressly repeals the entire rules called the bombay Village Panchayat (Panchayat Secretaries) (Conditions of Service) rules 1948. The attempt to read the expression 'corresponding to any of the aforesaid Rules 2 to 17' as qualifying the Bombay Rules also, does not carry the matter any further. It was sought to be made out that the mysore Rules dealt only with the initial stage of recruitment or appointment and that therefore the Bombay Rules Nos. 18 to 25 which deal with conditions of service applicable subsequent to the stage of recruitment or appointment do not stand repealed, because they do not correspond to any of the Rules 2 to 17 of the Mysore Rules, but Rule 15 of the Mysore Rules expressly states that the Mysore Civil Services Rules 1958, the Mysore Govt. Servants' Conduct Rules, 1957 and other rules for the time being in force regulating the conditions of service of Government servants made under the proviso to Art. 309 of the Constitution in so far as they are not inconsistent with the provisions of these rules, shall be applicable to persons to whom these rules apply. It is clear therefore that regulating the conditions of service is one of the topics dealt with by the Mysore Rules. If any corresponding rules are contained in the rules made by the Bombay enactment or any other enactment repealed by 3. It is clear therefore that regulating the conditions of service is one of the topics dealt with by the Mysore Rules. If any corresponding rules are contained in the rules made by the Bombay enactment or any other enactment repealed by 3. 242 (1) of the Mysore Village panchayats and Local Boards Act, 1959, they stand repealed or superseded. ( 5 ) IT is not necessary, therefore, to examine the case of the petitioners from the point of view of Rule 23 of the Bombay Rules. ( 6 ) ON the next question whether the petitioners may be regarded as Government servants liable to transfer as such, the relevant sections of the Mysore Village Panchayats and Local Boards Act, are 80, 81, 82, and 221. ( 7 ) UNDER sub-sec. (1) of S. 80, every Panchayat shall have a Secretary who shall be appointed by the Commissioner in accordance with such rules as may be prescribed, subject to a proviso permitting two or more panchayats to have the same person as Secretary with which we are not now concerned, Under one of the provisos to Sec. 242, any appointment made under any of the repealed Acts, has to be deemed to have been made under the corresponding provisions of the Mysore Act. it follows therefore that the petitioners though appointed by the Panchayat under the bombay Act, must now be regarded as persons appointed by the commissioner having jurisdiction under sub-sec. (1) of S. 80 of the Mysore act. At the same time, the other provisions of the Act show that the salary of the Secretary has to be paid out of the funds of the Panchayat ( 8 ) SUB-SECTION (2) of the section provides:"subject to the provisions of rules made under the proviso to art. 309 of the Constitution, the qualifications, powers, duties, remuneration and conditions of service including disciplinary matters of such Secretary shall be such as may be prescribed. " ( 9 ) SECTION 221 provides among other things:" (1) Notwithstanding anything contained in any law for the time being in force, such posts under any Panchayat or Taluk Board as may be specified by the Government shall be filled by appointment of officers belonging to the Mysore Local Government Service. " ( 9 ) SECTION 221 provides among other things:" (1) Notwithstanding anything contained in any law for the time being in force, such posts under any Panchayat or Taluk Board as may be specified by the Government shall be filled by appointment of officers belonging to the Mysore Local Government Service. "section 223 makes provision for the constitution by the Government of a fund called the Local Government Establishment Fund to meet the expenditure in respect of salaries, allowances, pensions, provident fund, gratuties, etc. , payable to the officers of the Mysore Local Government Service. ( 10 ) IT is under the said provisions or towards the implementation of the policy declared in S. 221, that the Mysore Local Government Service (Panchayat Secretaries Branch) (Cadre and Recruitment) Rules, 1962, were promulgated. It will be seen that under S. 221, it is open to the state Government to specify not merely the post of a Secretary but also any other post that they may select to be a post to be filled by an officer or "member of the special branch of the State Government service called the Mysore Local Government Service. The rules of 1962 took up for treatment only one branch of such proposed service. Rule 2 states that the Mysore Local Government Service may comprise of as many branches as the Government may prescribe. Rule 3 prescribes that there shall be a branch of the Mysore Local Government Service called the mysore Local Government Service (Panchayat Secretaries) Branch. The rest of the rules make various provisions for recruitment relating thereto. Rule 2 states that the Mysore Local Government Service may comprise of as many branches as the Government may prescribe. Rule 3 prescribes that there shall be a branch of the Mysore Local Government Service called the mysore Local Government Service (Panchayat Secretaries) Branch. The rest of the rules make various provisions for recruitment relating thereto. The seventh rule is of importanre and it deals with initial recruitment to the posts of Panchayat Secretaries Grade I and Grade II included in the secretaries Branch; it reads as follows:"notwithstanding anything contained in these rules, recruitment for the first time in respect of the posts of Panchayat Secretaries, grade I and Grade II shall be made,- (i) by transfer of persons from other Departments holding equivalent posts, preference being given to those working in the Excise and prohibition Department, who will be rendered surplus as a result of the implementation of the policy of prohibition and to the retrenched officials of the Civil Supplies Department; and who will be selected by the Screening Committee-; (ii) by absorption of Executive Officers, Karbaries and Panchayat Secretaries who are permanent servants of Village Panchayats and who have a continuous record of good service and who are selected by the Screening Committee. "the next rule provides for constitution of such Screening Committee. ( 11 ) AS we have already pointed out, the petitioners by virtue of the provisions of S. 242 must be regarded as persons appointed by the Deputy commissioner under sub-sec. (1) of S. 80 of the Mysore Village Panchayats and Local Boards Act. The argument on behalf of the State Government has been that the said effect of the statute lends strong support to the possible inference that Secretaries of Panchayats in the position of the petitioners are a category of Government servants. In further support of this line of argument it was stated that S. 81 of the Act which requires a Panchayat to submit to the Deputy Commissioner a schedule of the number and salaries of its servants, and S. 82 which gives disciplinary powers to the Secretary of the Panchayat over its other employees, must be taken as clearly indicative of the fact that Secretary was a category apart from other employees or servants of the Panchayat. These two circumstances taken along with the further provision of sub-sec. These two circumstances taken along with the further provision of sub-sec. (2) of S. 80 that the rules describing or regulating the conditions of service of a Secty. are subject to the rules, if any, made under the proviso to Art. 309 of the Constn. , are said to indicate that the Secretary is one amenable to control by rules made under the proviso to Art. 309 which means that he must be regarded as occupying a civil post under the Government. ( 12 ) THE difficulty of accepting the full effect of this argument how- eyer is that the mere fact that appointment made by one of the officers of the Government under or in exercise of a statutory power of appointment does not necessarily mean that the appointee is a servant of the Government. Various institutions are governed or their affairs are controlled by statutes. One of the methods of exercising statutory control adopted by the long legislative history in this country, is to vest in one of the superior officers of the Government the statutory power of making appointments to the key positions in those institutions. The conferment of such a power and the appointments made in exercise of such a power do not, however, lead to the inference that the appointee is a Government servant. All that it means is that the statutory provision vesting the power of appointment in one of the officers of the Government is one of the modes of exercising effective control. ( 13 ) WE have already pointed out another factor which indicates the position contrary to the one put forward on behalf of the State government, viz. , that the salaries of the Secretaries like the petitioners in these cases are paid out of the funds of the respective Panchayats and not out of any State Funds. ( 14 ) THE next and the more clinching indication is found in Rule 7 of the Mysore Local Government Service (Panchayat Secretaries Branch) (Cadre and Recruitment) Rules, 1962, which we have already set out under S. 221, it is open to the Government to specify posts in the panchayat manned by Government servants. They have for the said purpose specified by the said rules that the Secretaries' posts will be as filled by government servants and those servants will be members of a class of service called the Mysore Local Government Service. They have for the said purpose specified by the said rules that the Secretaries' posts will be as filled by government servants and those servants will be members of a class of service called the Mysore Local Government Service. Both according to the intent of the section and the proposed operation of the Recruitment rules the first step is to build that class of service and then post members of that service to work as Secretaries of various Panchayats. Rule 7 of the rules dealing with initial recruitment shows that one of the modes of recruitment is absorption of various executive officers of the existing panchayats including Secretaries who are described in the rule itself, as 'permanent servants of Village Panchayats'. ( 15 ) WHAT follows is that until such absorption takes place, Secretaries of panchayats will be servants or continue to be servants of the panchayats which had employed them or in respect of which they had been appointed. They form a class of persons who are eligible for being recruited to the mysore Local Government Service. The mere possession of the eligibility is not in itself sufficient to convert them into Government servants belonging to the said class or category, of Government service ( 16 ) THE position becomes simpler and clearer if it is remembered that what is commonly described as the power of transfer enjoyed by the government as an employer is really an aspect or incident of the essential rule of law that every servant is bound to serve the master within the scope of the duties for which or for the discharge of which he has been employed So long as the work that he is asked to perform is within the scope of such duties, no servant can refuse to obey an order relating to the discharge of those duties. An order of transfer by the Government is an order directing its servants to perform the duties for which he had been appointed at a place different from the one at which he may be al the time the order is passed. The essence of the matter is that he is being asked to do the duty for which he had been employed and that is an order which he is bound to obey. ( 17 ) IN. The essence of the matter is that he is being asked to do the duty for which he had been employed and that is an order which he is bound to obey. ( 17 ) IN. the case of persons in the position of the petitioners, the scope of their duties flowing from the original appointment is that of the secretaries of the Panchayats in respect of which each one of them had been appointed. To transfer them to work as Secretary of another Panchayat is certainly not asking them to do the duty for which they had been originally employed. The order actually and in real effect means that he is asked to serve a master different from the one who had employed him. ( 18 ) LITTLE more need be said to support the contention of the petitioners that the orders of transfer impugned in these writ petitions could not have been made with competence. ( 19 ) IN each of these writ petitions, therefore, we issue a writ ing the impugned order of transfer in so far as it relates to the petitioner therein. ( 20 ) IN WP. No. 836 of 1970 we make an order allowing I. A. IV to amend the prayer by bringing up for quashing a subsequent order of transfer made consequent upon the original stay having been vacated. The nature of the writ mentioned above will Le such as to quash the said subsequent order also. In all the writ petitions, the parties will bear their own costs. --- *** --- .