Outgoing year turns out grim for educators

Employees face arrests and layoffs as pension-based job system collapses

RAWALPINDI:

The year 2025 ended as one of the most disheartening periods for government employees and teachers, pushing them toward economic ruin. Throughout the year, clerks, Class-IV employees, teachers, women staff, and dengue workers staged sit-ins, protests, pen-down strikes, and demonstrations on roads, facing baton charges, shelling, water cannons, police stations, and even jail, yet failed to secure a single demand.

Exhausted and divided into groups, employees are now limited to verbal and symbolic protests.

A few union leaders aligned with the government secured selective concessions, weakening the collective movement.

Despite prolonged protests, the contract system was completely overhauled, ending any future regularisation. Contract employees will now receive only lump-sum salaries, without benefits, pensions, or gratuities.

In 2025, not a single regular recruitment was made across 44 government departments.

Rationalisation, layoffs, and the sale of 15,000 schools and 71 colleges increased unemployment, while the pension-based employment system was dismantled. From 2026 onward, all government hiring will be pension-free and based on lump-sum pay.

Union leaders alleged that around 300 individuals from teachers' and clerks' unions struck secret deals with the government, securing full benefits and protected retirements while weakening broader employee movements.

Over the past three years, teachers' organisations split into 61 groups, while clerks' unions also fragmented, leaving ordinary employees helpless.

Despite five major sit-ins across Punjab and Islamabad and spending nights on roads, protests failed due to leadership-level compromises.

Arrests were symbolic, negotiations proved hollow, and major announcements evaporated with time. Leaders who secured private benefits are expected to retire with full privileges within one to one-and-a-half years.

All Pakistan Clerks Association Central Vice President Shahzad Manzoor Kiyani said the current government proved the worst for employees, noting that benefits granted since 1947, including protections provided during Nawaz Sharif and Shehbaz Sharif's tenures, have been withdrawn.

Educators Association President Basharat Iqbal Raja said the education department was turned into an experiment, with school sales and teacher dismissals making education expensive and increasing dropouts.

He warned that street children could reach 30 million in 2026.

Education Department Pensioners Association Secretary Shafiq Bahlolia said education and health sectors were being dismantled through planned policies, pensions reduced by up to 40 per cent, and lump-sum salary systems discouraging youth from government jobs.

He warned that due to deep fragmentation, no future movement of government employees or teachers would succeed.