Police raid school to arrest wanted teachers in the capital

Teachers announce plans to observe October 5 as black day

ISLAMABAD: Just days before International World Teachers Day, police in the capital on Wednesday raided a government college to arrest teachers working on daily wages against whom outstanding cases are pending.

Teachers claimed that they were being victimized and have decided to observe October 5, World Teacher Day, as a black day to protest police high-handedness.

On Wednesday, four police officers, including two women police officers, raided the Islamabad Model College for Girls in Sector G-10/2 to arrest Rabia Waheed. Waheed was a representative of the protesting teachers but she managed to dodge the officers.



The teachers claimed that they had been summoned by the police to secure the bails-before arrest. But the teachers explained that since the government had not paid them for the past four months, they did not have any money to afford the legal fees or pay the bail bonds.

However, the teachers — who have protested against the government in the past as well — were not expecting police raids and arrests, hoping that the police would sympathise with their cause and the fact that they were not criminals.

But after hearing about the raids, some teachers approached the courts seeking bails. The teachers noted that when they were in the opposition, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leaders, including State Minister for Interior Shehryar Afridi, Federal Finance Minister Asad Umar, MNA Nafeesa Khattak and others used to support their cause. But after coming into power, the attitude of these lawmakers seems to have undergone a transformation.

“They were with us in our protest on that day too when the FIR was registered. It is quite shameful that teachers are being treated like criminals on an old FIR for demanding their rights” lamented Fahd Miraj, a college teacher who is nominated in the FIR.

“With the PTI coming into power, there has been no change in the problem faced by teaching fraternity,” he complained.

After coming into power and ascending to the office of ministers, they have stopped responding to us, he said, adding that despite the claims from Prime Minister Imran Khan of according  priority to education, the government failed to announce anything for teachers in the mini-budget.

The least they can do is release our meagre salaries on time,” Miraj said in a veiled swipe at the government’s claims that the state’s coffers are empty. On February 28, daily wage teachers and non-teaching staff of government schools and colleges in Islamabad, mostly women, had blocked the Kashmir Highway at Sector G-9 Chowk to protest against their unpaid wages and the government’s reluctance to regularise their services.



The protest had descended into chaos when the police dragged and then briefly detained the protesters. Later an FIR was also registered against 20 protesting teachers, most against female teachers who had staged a sit-in on the thoroughfare.

The protest by the contractual teaching and non-teaching staffers of various schools and colleges working on daily-wage basis came along with a four-month strike in educational institutes of the federal capital from January 9 to till May 9, seeking the release of their unpaid salaries for nine months.

With a new fiscal year beginning, around 2,000 daily wage teachers and non-teaching staff have again been waiting for the government to release their minimum-wage salaries.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 4^th, 2018.