Sarthak Kanjilal
Port Blair, Oct 20: Once again the salaries of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan Contract Teachers have been halted for more than two months, forcing many families to suffer inhumanly that too in their difficult place of postings.
The lowly paid contract teachers have not been paid salary for the month of August and September yet.
Last year Andaman Sheekha had highlighted about a similar incident after which the then Lt. Governor had intervened into this matter and asked the Education Department to clear the payment from Administration’s fund. One wonders why it is not done this year too.
SSCT teachers get less salary than regular teachers but even though they have to do all tasks, like regular teachers, sometimes even more.
With the meager salary they get, they have to pay rent in remote possible areas of posting and support two families, one at the place of posting and another at Port Blair.
No salary for two months means untold miseries for these contract teachers. Many have to borrow money from others while others have to listen to the abuses of landlords for not paying room rent.
“Because there was no salary since last two months, Durga Puja this year, was already low key and now it seems Deepawali will also be mean Darkness for us,” said a teacher who does not want his name to be quoted.
When contacted the Secretary of Education Department, Mrs. Tanvy Garg assured early action in this regard.
“We are in repeated touch with the finance division of MHRD. It is not like we are not concerned in this matter, I am in regular touch with the Finance Division of MHRD and have also called the Additional Secretary, MHRD, Mrs Reena Ray twice to request her to release the funds for paying salary to the teachers of SSA. Hopefully by next week funds will be released so that we can pay the salary to all SSA Teachers,” the Secretary said.
She added that this delay is also because the funding pattern has changed.
“Now 100% of funding is done by the Ministry and thus there are teething problems and it is expected that flow of funds will get back to normalcy in coming years,” she added.
