Our Correspondent
Kohima, June 18 (EMN): Even before the dust had settled at the directorate of School Education following the sit-in protest called by SSA teachers, another group of teachers called the All Nagaland Ad hoc Teachers Group (ANATG), batch of 2015, has started an indefinite protest demanding regularisation of their services.
On Monday, 1166 ‘aggrieved’ ad hoc teachers converged at the directorate to show their resentment against the ‘failure’ of the government to regularise their services in spite of standing orders and notifications.
A memorandum of the state’s government on August 4 2008 had stated that ‘contract employees who have completed more than three years of continuous service on contract / ad hoc will be eligible for regularisation against sanctioned post.’
The memorandum stated that a suitability test should be conducted by the department in concern and presided over by the head of the administrative department with a representative from the P & AR and the ATI. Qualifying marks, it stated, should be stipulated in advance and that only those who qualify from such a screening test should be considered for regularisation.
Members of the group said that the ad hoc teachers submitted relevant documents following the direction of the department. 1166 teachers qualified in the suitability test, which was conducted on May 20 2017, it was informed.
The ad hoc teachers, they said, have also gone through spot-verification on May 22 2017 and received clearance from the P&AR department and were awaiting cabinet approval.
Talking to media persons, ANATG’s President Rüguotsolie said, “We are a group of aggrieved ad hoc teachers who have been rendering our service for 8-9 years with meagre fixed pay salary of INR 6700 for primary teachers and INR 8400 for graduate teachers. We are here to show our resentment against the government’s failure to give us what is rightfully due to us, as the government is still reluctant to regularise our service.”
Also, the group’s spokesperson Bendangtemsu Ozukum said it had become impossible for the teachers to meet ‘daily requirements’ and the price escalations with a meagre fixed salary.
Citing ‘technical problems,’ Wonthungo Tsopoe, the director of School Education, said that regularisation of the 1166 ad hoc teachers has not been done yet. He admitted that the services of the teachers who qualified from the suitability test conducted by the department are supposed to be regularised.
Accordingly, Tsopoe said, the matter was sent to the Cabinet for approval. However, that before the Cabinet could decide on it, the Acaut and PSAN filed a petition challenging the government notification on regularisation and contract / ad hoc employees in the state.
As the case is in the court, he maintained that unless the case is settled, the state cannot do anything. However, he said that once the case is settled, within no time service regularisation shall be done. “The ball is in the hands of the court,” he stated.
The ANATG has stated that it doesn’t come under the purview of the petition filed by Acaut and PSAN, and that the group has met the Acaut, which was said to have made it clear that ad hoc teachers were exempt.
ANATG members said that the 1166 ad hoc employees are not part of the respondent in said petition or in the complaint.
However, the ANATG lamented that the cabinet in its meeting on November 11 2017 as notified by a memorandum dated Nov. 13 2017 deferred agenda-44 which was about regularising 1166 graduate teachers, primary teachers and various other categories without citing any reasons.
In a representation to the department of School Education on March 29 2018, the ANATG’s 2015 batch stated ‘the cabinet deferring our agenda without citing reasons is uncalled for as it affecting our legitimate rights for regularisation after serving the government for so many years.’
Lamenting the ‘indifferent attitude of the government’ to the 1166 ‘aggrieved teachers,’ the ANATG requested consideration of its grievances and necessary action, in an ultimatum dated April 30 2018 to the department.
It cautioned that “if our demand is not fulfilled, the aggrieved 1166 teachers actively involved in the teaching-learning process, imparting quality education across the state shall abstain from work and start exercising our fundamental rights in the form of protests and agitations and take its own course of action where, if any unwanted circumstances arises, the ANATG shall not be held responsible.”
While accusing the department of having some ‘hidden agendas’, one of the teachers said “the government has come out with a reason that due to the Acaut and PSAN court case they couldn’t take up our case. But then, if the government really wanted to regularise our services, they could have just done so.”
Stating that in Nagaland things happen only when aggrieved parties agitate, Ozukum informed that the two-day sit-in protest would be followed by ‘display’ of placards and banners.
