Punjab teachers set Dec 15 as D-day

Threaten to launch protests if demands not met.

ISLAMABAD:

The Punjab Teachers Association has threatened to go on protest if its demands are not met by December 15.

The association had presented the charter of demands to the provincial education authorities on July 21.

The key demands of the teachers is to have their pay packages brought at par with their counterparts in Balochistan, Azad Kashmir and Islamabad.

The charter also includes regularisation of all teachers working on contractual basis, increase in their house rent allowance and shifting control of the education department from the district administration to the provincial government.

Rawalpindi School Teachers Association President Sagheer Ahmed said that despite assurances, the provincial government has thus far “failed to meet their demands”.

He said that teachers across the province would come on the streets to push their demands and get rights from the authorities just as doctors and nurses did.

Sagheer maintained that contract employees whose services have been regularised on the directives of the Supreme Court should be regularised from their dates of appointment rather than the date of the court order.

He said that the teachers protest would start from first of February and converge on Islamabad from across the country on May 22.

Sagheer cited discrimination in basic scale of teacher of Punjab and Islamabad. He said that the basic pay scale of a primary teacher in the federal area is BPS-14, whereas in Punjab it is BPS-9. “Due to difference in the pay scale, teachers in Punjab are getting Rs5,000 to Rs7,000 less than teachers in other parts of the country. This difference also affects all allowances including house rent and medical,” he added.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 30^th, 2011.