Denies allegations: UP teacher suspended for FB posts on Pakistan win, Kashmir

The state education department on Wednesday suspended a government primary school teacher in Aligarh district for allegedly posting “anti-national and anti-government comments” on his Facebook page. Dharmendra Kumar, 35, a Dalit, is posted at a primary school in Alipur locality, Bijauli block. “Dharmendra allegedly congratulated the Pakistani cricket team for winning the match… he writes that J&K is not part of India as GST was not applicable there. The complaint letter forwarded has 10 screenshots of his Facebook posts,” Aligarh Basic Shiksha Adhikari Dhirendra Singh Yadav, who has been tasked with conducting an inquiry into the matter, said.

“Other posts include objectionable comments against PM Narendra Modi and CM Yogi Adityanath…. On the basis of the inquiry report, the decision to lodge an FIR will be taken,” he added. The action was taken following directives from UP Minister of State for Primary, Secondary and Higher Education Sandeep Singh, who had allegedly received a complaint from another government school teacher. Singh ordered an inquiry and the teacher was suspended on the basis of a preliminary probe.

Additional Director (Basic Education), Aligarh, Girijesh Chowdhary said he had received a letter from Singh’s office in this regard about a week ago. Dharmendra said, “I myself am a cricket player, and so congratulated the Pakistan cricket team when they won a match on June 18. I did not make any anti-national comment. As regards to my post on Jammu and Kashmir, I merely questioned why GST is not charged there…”