Teachers’ body demands reopening of schools, release of salaries

Demanding the reopening of schools and release of salaries to the teachers recruited in 2012, the Government Secondary Teachers Association (GSTA) on Monday announced a symbolic hunger strike at the Karachi Press Club on December 30.

The association has also accused the provincial government of deliberately destroying the education system in the state-run schools in the name of the Covid-19 pandemic. “The PPP government kept the children of Sindh away from schools under the pretext of Covid-19 to cover up its failure while holding political meetings itself,” GSTA Central President Maqsood Mehmood Mahesar said in the statement issued on Monday.

He added that the government should immediately reopen government schools across the province and issue salaries to the teachers who were recruited in 2012 by the school education and literacy department. Mahesar also hinted at a long march of teachers from Kashmore in the last week of January 2021.

He pointed out that there was a shortage of teachers in Sindh. Therefore, 40,000 teachers should be recruited immediately across Sindh and only teachers should be appointed and promoted on administrative posts, he said, adding that the association had decided in a meeting to make 2021 a standard academic year for which the GSTA would start a compressive campaign at the community level.

He said the GSTA had presented a seven-point charter of demand regarding the problems of teachers, but the authorities concerned did not keep their promises. We demand immediate payment of salaries of other cadre teachers recruited in the year 2012 across Sindh, including Karachi, and permanent promotion of teachers who passed the NTS, Sindh University, Iqra University and IBA tests.

He added that the junior school teachers should be given the basic pay scale 17 and all employees should be given group insurance at the time of retirement. The department should give promotions to the high school teachers as well as issue offer letters for candidates who had secured 50 per cent or more marks in the IBA test.