DDU college (Photo Credit: Shiksha)Citing “paucity of funds”, Delhi University’s Deen Dayal Upadhyaya College has released only a part of teachers’ salaries for the month of July, which they received only in September.
The college—one of the 12 DU colleges fully funded by the Delhi government—issued a notice stating it has retained Rs 30,000 and Rs 50,000 from the salary of Assistant and Associate Professors for July.
“This is for the information of all permanent teaching staff that due to paucity of funds, Rs 30,000 has been retained from the net salary of Assistant Professors and Rs 50,000 from net salary of Associate Professors for the month of July 2022. The same will be released as and when the funds are available,” read the notice issued by officiating principal Hem Chand Jain. Teachers have not been paid their salary for August.
The college’s governing body, in turn, states that the funds have been released. The governing body chairman Sunil Kumar has written to the principal asking for an explanation.
“When the required amount was released under salary head by the DHE (Department of Higher Education), it is learnt that employees of college have been paid their salary for July after retaining Rs 50,000 of associate professor and Rs 30,000 of assistant professor. Please clarify with whose permission you deducted this amount,” read the communication.
According to a teacher in the college, they received their July salaries just a few days back. “The grant for up to September has been released but because a number of teachers have been promoted in the past year, it has not been sufficient to cover all the salary costs… For the past two years, there has been a conflict between the AAP government and the governing body aligned with it and the principal who is aligned with the (RSS-affiliated) National Democratic Teachers Front, and the staff have been caught in the middle of it. It is now routine for salaries to be delayed for months,” the teacher said.
The latest flare-up has been after the governing body chairpersons of all Delhi University colleges funded by the Delhi government—including DDU—wrote to the Vice-Chancellor alleging that the recent Executive Council discussions on the ‘harassment’ of principals of two of these colleges—DDU and Swami Shraddhanand College—by their GBs was “politically motivated”. “While performing our duties, we are very much committed to the values of honesty, probity, integrity, transparency and inclusiveness as espoused by the present Delhi government. We have been very much sensitive and responsive to the concerns raised by Hon’ble National and State OBC Commissions, DUTA, AC and EC Members and student activists. This pinches some such Principals who are arbitrary, authoritarian, insensitive and habitual of wearing the badge of close proximity to the central ruling party on their sleeves,” they had written.