Daily wage teachers may spend another Eid without pay

Teachers accuse government of turning blind eye to their suffering

ISLAMABAD: Hundreds of teaching and non-teaching staff working on daily wages in various schools and colleges of the capital will once again be celebrating an Eid without salaries.

These staffers were last paid on May 31 earlier this year. They have been working in schools and colleges of Federal Directorate of Education (FDE) without any benefits or salary ever since.



These and non-teaching staffers complain that they are entitled to a meagre salary of around Rs15,000 but have not been paid for the past three months even though the institutions have funds, paying college principals double salaries for the morning and evening shifts.

“Every year we receive salaries after months and after we stage protests,” complained Fahad Khan, a daily-wage teacher at the Islamabad Model College for Boys (IMCB) in Sector I-8/3.

“It is a painful fact for employees that they have not been paid on this religious festival when everybody wants to celebrate the occasion with their families,

he added, noting that they did not have any money for Eidul Fitr also.

A teacher said that Qandeel Khursheed, a student at the Islamabad Model College for Girls in Sector I-10/4, had topped the annual matriculation exams conducted by the Federal Board after being taught by a daily-wage teacher.

“Her English teacher works on a daily-wage basis,” the teacher said.

On Wednesday a prize distribution ceremony was held at the college where the Minister of State for Capital Administration and Development Division (CADD) Dr Tariq Fazl Chaudhry awarded prizes to position holders but he did not talk about the plight of daily-wage teachers who were working without being paid, the teacher said.

“The teachers were not even allowed to meet the minister,” the teacher lamented, adding, “Nobody is happy on Eid. We do not know when will our suffering end”.

A teacher of Physics, who produced the highest grade point average of 5.84, is also a daily wage teacher at the same college,” the teachers sighed.



The teachers lamented how the directorate remembered to give the teacher a certificate of appreciation but did not bother about the fact that the teacher has not been paid for the last three months.

Since daily-wage teachers are not counted among permanent government staff, their salaries are not overtly listed in the annual budget for the department. Instead, they are paid through a series of supplementary grants released by the finance ministry.

These grants are always subject to procedural delays every year.

To resolve the issue, the teachers had approached the Islamabad High Court, but Justice Athar Minallah has reserved the judgement on petitions filed by 200 teachers.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 31^st, 2017.