NARAYANA PAI, CJ. ( 1 ) PETITIONER who was working as Medical Officer of the Industrial institute at Bangalore has been compulsorily retired from service in exercise of the power under Note-1 appended to Rule 285 of the Mysore Civil service Rules. He impugns the said order on several grounds set out in the affidavit in support of the petition. Apparently in view of the fact that most of the contentions are now covered by rulings of the Supreme court and of this Court, the only point which has been strongly urged by mr. Venkataranga lyengar for the petitioner is that the order, in the" circumstances of the case, must be held to have been vitiated by bias and mala fides. ( 2 ) THE case of the bias, briefly stated, is that the Director of Employment and Training had what is described in the affidavit as "a sort of hatred and prejudice towards the petitioner" and that it is this prejudice that has ultimately operated in the making of the order of compulsory retirement. ( 3 ) THE order was preceded as in the case of several others by the examination of the petitioner's case from the point of view of Note-1 to rule 285 of the MCSRs. by a committee called the Screening Committee, the members of that Committee were the Secretary and the Under-Secretary of the Department of Food, Supply and Labour, the Director of Employment and Training mentioned above and the Joint Director of the same Dept. The report of the Committee was later placed before the minister for Labour and it is only after the examination of the case that way that the petitioner was compulsorily retired from service. ( 4 ) THE case of mala fides is confined to the Director of Employment and Training. We should say at the outset that there is not the slightest suggestion of any personal bias or mala fides against any of the other members of the Screening Committee or against the Minister who finally assented to the making of the order. It is, therefore, necessary to examine whether there is any strength in the case of mala fides against the Director and also further whether the prejudice or bias, if any, of the Director has been actual operative bias in the circumstances of the case. It is, therefore, necessary to examine whether there is any strength in the case of mala fides against the Director and also further whether the prejudice or bias, if any, of the Director has been actual operative bias in the circumstances of the case. ( 5 ) THE first circumstance which the petitioner cites as suggestive of bias or prejudice on the part of the Director is that he (the petitioner) was posted to work under a person, who though functioning as the Principal of the institute, was a non-Gazetted Government servant and that in spite of representations made by him to the effect that it was humiliating for him to work under a non-Gazetted Government servant, the Director did not make any arrangements to relieve him from that humiliation It is next stated that the Director though he did not have the power to do so, made an order transferring the petitioner from Bangalore to Hubli and that the petitioner had to come to Court with WP. 104 of 1967 to get rid of the order. Actually the Government themselves filed a memo in the said writ petition to the effect that the order suffered from technical defect and that the same will not be implemented. ( 6 ) THE next large charge of mala fides against the Director is that he had made certain serious adverse remarks against the petitioner in his confidential report for the year 1966. Adverse remarks in the said report are ''unsatisfactory; found to be quarrelsome with colleagues; an officer of an undesirable type". The petitioner was served with a copy of the adverse remarks some time in May 1967 and he made a representation in that regard on the 12th of July 1967. In the said representation, the petitioner has, for the first time, stated against the Director that all the adverse remarks under reference were passed on personal prejudice. He goes on to cite his transfer order as one oi the instances of personal prejudice and then he proceeds to give what he describes as the background for the said personal prejudice and winds up by saying that although the principal of the Institute himself was solely and entirely responsible for several unfortunate incidents at the Institution, had misguided or misrepresented facts by false and fabricated reports to the Director. ( 7 ) IT might be mentioned that the petitioner himself has admitted that on an earlier occasion the same Director was responsible for getting his post upgrades and extending to him the benefit of higher rate of conveyance allowance. ( 8 ) IT is legitimate, therefore, to conclude that the first time the petitioner conceived any notion of the Director acting with prejudice against him was when he sought to transfer him from Bangalore to Hubli. So far as the representations with regard to the adverse remarks are concerned, the impression given clearly is that the Director has been prejudiced or misguided by the Principal of the Institute. It is admitted that the Director was originally well disposed and certainly not ill-disposed towards the petitioner. One may, therefore, ask whether he can be so easily misled by the Principal. ( 9 ) WE then find the petitioner making a long representation to the government on the llth of July 1969 in which he makes the following allegation against the Director, after referring to his transfer and WP. No. 104 of 1967 questioning the order of transfer:"after this unhappy incident, to my bad luck, the previous Director developed a sort of hatred and prejudice towards me and even expressed that he would throw me out of this Department. As a first step towards this end, he wrote an adverse Annual Cofidential Report describing me as "an Officer of an undesirable type. " ( 10 ) IT is legitimate to infer that this allegation against the Director that he would throw the petitioner out of the Department and that as a. result of the filing of the writ petition against the transfer order he made the adverse remarks in the Confidential report as a first step towards throwing the petitioner out of the Department is either a case of strong suspicion developed out of the apprehension that he might be retired as certain others of the Department were also expected or feared to be retired, or have been made with deliberate intention of attributing mala fides to the Director with a view to lay the foundation for such a case to get rid of a retirement order, if one is made. ( 11 ) COMPARING the attitude of the petitioner disclosed in his representation of july 1967 in regard to the adverse remarks and his attitude in the representation to the Government made on the 11th of July 1969, one cannot escape the inference that what is stated in the later representations does not represent the true state of affairs but only emphasizes the tact that the petitioner was stepping himself to unnecessary suffering by giving way to unlounded suspicions. ( 12 ) WE are not satisfied that even a case ot personal prejudice can at all be made or suggested against the Director. ( 13 ) BY way of developing a case of legal mala fides Mr. Venkata- ranga lyengar suggested and strongly urged tnat me fact that tne Director had previously formea a definitely bad opinion about the petitioner would itself generate blas, 11 he (the Director) snould serve as a member of the Screening Committee because he cannot like any otner numan being get rid of the opinion already formed by him about the petitioner. ( 14 ) THE last mentioned human propensity may be accepted as correct. It is not necessary nowever that with a view to be good a man should necessarily change his opinions it they have been formed alter careful reasoning. What is wrong is coming to hasty opinions, 11 the opinion is arrived at after a careful reasoning, mere is nothing wrong in a man sticking to it unless he is persuaded by stronger reasoning to change the same. The fact, therefore, that the Director has expressed himself in strong terms need not necessarily be taken as uncomplimentary o mm or condemnatory of his opinion. ( 15 ) IT is also part of the official duty of the Head of a Department to form opinions about his subordinates after watching their omcial conduct. If in the discharge of that duty a Head of the Department ascertains facts and looks into facts and puts down his opinion about his subordinate in a confidential record, the said process of discharging one's official duty can never be regarded as investing the person with bias. The position of course is different if, apart from any opinion flowing from a dispassionate examination of official conduct, an offcial superior permits his private or personal prejudice to colour his official opinion. The position of course is different if, apart from any opinion flowing from a dispassionate examination of official conduct, an offcial superior permits his private or personal prejudice to colour his official opinion. ( 16 ) IN this case, as already stated, we are not satisfied that it is possible to attribute personal prejudice or any bias to the Director as against the petitioner. If so, the opinion expressed by him in the confidential report must be regarded as representing his true unbiased opinion about the official conduct of the petitioner. If such an opinion has been properly formed, the fact that he later became a member of the Screening committee cannot make the same unavailable. Indeed he will be assisting the committee with the said opinion formed as it is upon facts which he had the opportunity to observe as the Head of the Department. ( 17 ) FURTHER, as already stated, there is no allegation of any bias against any one of the other members of the Committee. ( 18 ) THE result, therefore, is that it is impossible to accept the case of the petitioner that there was such mala fides or bias as is sufficient to vitiate the order of compulsory retirement made against him. Writ Petition is dismissed. --- *** --- .