Reallocation policy: Talks between teachers, authorities on Aug 11

Education department had reshuffled over 500 teachers in Rawalpindi Division.

RAWALPINDI:

The provincial education department has invited representatives of school teachers to rethink the disputed teachers’ reallocation policy it had announced earlier this year. 

The Lahore High Court Rawalpindi Bench had suspended the policy on July 15, directing the provincial government to revise it within two weeks. Some 20 representatives of the Punjab Teachers Union (PTU) from Rawalpindi had petitioned the court against the policy, which sets the teacher-students ratio at 1:40.

The education department transferred more than 500 teachers in the Rawalpindi Division under the reallocation policy. Some 60 teachers from Taxila tehsil, 89 from Kallar Syedan, 90 from Kotli Sattian, 85 from Kahuta and 200 from Gujar Khan were reshuffled.

The teachers, however, argue that the policy had increased their workload.

Punjab School Education Department Secretary Abdul Jabbar Shaheen has now invited PTU President Raja Shahid Mubarik on August 11 in Lahore to amend the plan, an education department official told The Express Tribune on Saturday.

Rawalpindi Executive District Officer (EDO) Education Qazi Zahoorul Haq confirmed that the secretary has called a meeting with teachers union representatives on August 11.

He said that the basic agenda of the meeting is to discuss the matter with the teachers. “The secretary will hear their point of view and will try to alleviate their concerns. Teachers had protested that they were not taken on board when the new policy was being formulated,” he said.

The EDO did not think the department will accept all the demands of the teachers.

Raja Shahid Mubarik confirmed that he has been invited to the meeting on August 11. “We appreciate that the department wants to listen to our point of view,” he commented. Mubarik, however, said the teachers will move court again if the authorities did not accept their demands.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 3^rd, 2014.