Schoolteachers ignored for govt honorarium

Say differentiation between employees is unacceptable

LAHORE: Government schoolteachers in Punjab are unhappy because only employees of the federal government have received the honorarium of three basic pays, whereas the privilege did not extend to provincial employees.

In a statement issued on Saturday, Punjab Teachers’ Union (PTU) appreciated the move to grant the honorarium equivalent of three basic pays for federal government employees, but added provincial employees were hard hit by ever-increasing inflation. He outlined that the same was honorarium was not extended to provincial teachers.

The statement was issued by the PTU leadership, including Central President Chaudhry Muhammad Sarfaraz, Syed Sajjad Akbar Kazmi, Rana Liaquat Ali, Jam Sadiq, Rana Anwar, Rana Altaf Hussain, Sajid Mahmood Chisti, Abdul Qaqum Rahi, Syed Namdar and others.



According to the statement, “The status of the state is like a mother and mothers don’t differentiate between their children.” The PTU leadership said that the prime minister should have played his role and announced the three-month honorarium for every government employee of the country.

They said that as many as three million government employees are working day and night for the stability and progress of the country. They asked why then the additional pay was announced for just federal employees? The statement said that differentiation between federal and provincial government employees was unacceptable. “Therefore, the prime minister should, at once, announce the honorarium for all the government employees of the country.”

They said that if the current government continued to differentiate between the federal and provincial employees, they would face the consequences in the upcoming general elections. “The three million employees equate to 15 million votes,” the statement added.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 27^th, 2018.