Teachers to agitate for payment of revised salaries

PATNA: Taking strong exception to the reported dilly-dallying tactics adopted by the authorities concerned in fixation of salaries of teachers in the revised payscale, Patna University (PU) teachers have decided to resort to direct action to lodge their protest.

Patna University Teachers' Association (PUTA) has given a call to its members to hold a demonstration in front of PU office on Tuesday to press immediate fixation of their salaries in the revised scale and start payment of revised salaries. PUTA will also disturb the meeting of the university Syndicate scheduled for Wednesday if its demand is not accepted, said general secretary Randhir Kumar Singh.

He pointed out that a decision to implement the revised UGC payscales for college and university teachers was taken by the state government in July this year and a letter to this effect was sent to all the universities by the HRD department on July 29.

As per government decision, the teachers were supposed to get revised salaries from the month of September. Teachers of various categories filled up the prescribed proforma of revised scale and submitted the same to the registrar in August.

Subsequently, PU constituted Pay Fixation Committee headed by statistics department head Arun Kumar Sinha which completed the entire fixation work in October. However, the pay fixation has been kept pending for the last two months due to the failure of the university to convene a meeting of the Committee. The university authorities are evading the meeting, Singh alleged.

In the meantime, the HRD department has sent several reminders to the university for finalizing the pay fixation of teachers and non-teaching staff in the revised scale and preparation of the university's budget accordingly.

PU Syndicate member Rajiv Ranjan Prasad has also expressed his concern over the inordinate delay in pay fixation of university teachers in the revised scale and demanded immediate meeting of the statutory Committee.

Source:TOI