2,605 teachers’ posts in govt PU colleges in state lying vacant

BENGALURU: Government pre-university colleges across the state are grappling with shortage of lecturers. Children are forced to study under the guidance of part-time lecturers even as several posts are lying vacant owing to technical issues for two years now.According to information from the Pre-University Education (PUE) department, of the total 12,000 sanctioned posts, 2,605 are vacant across 1,269 government PU colleges. This translates to almost 21% vacancies.

The last time recruitment for PU lecturers, which is usually a three-four month process, happened was in 2013. The notice to recruit around 1,200 lecturers in 2015 was halted as it was challenged by many people. Students of the Commerce stream students are the worst hit as the maximum vacancies exist in this stream. As many as 559 posts to teach Business Studies are vacant. Kannada Studies is the second worst-hit subject with 322 vacancies while the English stream has 222 vacancies. Meanwhile, the colleges are managing with part-time lecturers to overcome the shortage. “The powers to recruit eligible lecturers on part-time basis was given to the principals of the colleges concerned for time being. As the colleges have recruited part-time lecturers, the academics of the students was not disturbed,” said a senior official.

An increase in demand for Commerce courses at the PU level in the last few years has resulted in a shortage of Commerce subject teachers. To address this, the PUE department is now considering shifting sanctioned posts around in order to meet the demand. The post of a lecturer, allotted to each school, can be shifted to another school where the demand is higher.

Primary and Secondary Education Minister Tanveer Sait said, “As the number of Science teachers is more and students are less in some schools, we have decided to shift those Science teachers’ posts to Commerce. Excess Science teachers will also be shifted to the Science colleges where there are vacancies.”Sait said the recruitment process of 1,201 lecturers which is halted since 2015, will be finalised soon. “Due to several issues the process was stopped. Now, everything is cleared and Karnataka Examinations Authority will soon announce the dates for conducting entrance test,” he said. He even promised that the process will be completed before February 2018.

No principals in 806 colleges  

Not just lecturers, several government PU colleges do not even have principals. Of the 1,269 colleges, 806 do not have principals. During the 2016 academic year, the department recruited 414 and 129 posts were filled through direct recruitment. “Even the posts of principals will be filled by February,” Sait added.