Teachers of Government Senior Secondary School, Mansa, taking a pledge not to seek extension after retirement
Days after government teachers in Punjab started a drive to not seek extensions after retirement so more teachers can get jobs, state Finance Minister Manpreet Singh Badal’s Budget announcement of reducing the retirement age from 60 to 58 years has come as a welcome surprise for them.
The state government had even announced it would forego the extension policy which was introduced by the previous SAD-BJP regime. This decision is to be implemented for all government departments.
The Teacher Eligibility Test (TET) Pass Unemployed B.Ed Teachers Association, who is sitting on a day-night dharna in Sangrur since September 5, has also welcomed this decision.
Several government teachers had started organising pledge ceremonies in school campuses urging teachers not to seek extension after retirement.
Hardev Kumar, principal of Government Senior Secondary School, in Mansa district’s Jhunir said, “Last week teachers of my school took a pledge that they will not seek extension as it can give chances to the new teachers and hence can end unemployment.” Hardev was earlier in Balial village’s government school in Sangrur and even there he had done the same. I had been going to many schools and till now over 100 teachers have already taken a pledge in the past one week itself. I am happy that the Punjab government decided to end extension policy. I feel pained to see unemployed youth protesting on roads.”
He further said, “Thousands of teachers are working on 2 years’ extension in Punjab. Apart from this, if an employee is a national awardee or state awardee or is disabled, he/she is given another 2 years of extension. Many teachers in Sangrur, Mansa are in their 61st year and are still working.”
Randeep Sangatpura, press secretary of the Unemployed Teachers Association, said, “This is a victory of our struggle as our unemployed teachers are sitting on dharna since September 5 outside DC Sangrur’s office. “But teachers are not ending their dharna even now, though Punjab government advertised 2,182 posts for teachers as teachers said that out of these posts, only 40 are for Hindi, 60 for Punjabi teachers and 52 for social science teachers. Rest are for maths and science. Our association does not have maths and science teachers as their members, and over 35,000 TET pass teachers are of the above mentioned subjects only. Moreover, another 1,800 teachers are slated to retire by March 31 this year. So we want teachers of all subjects to be absorbed in a proportional manner, rather than focusing only on maths and science.”