Honorarium discontinued, unaided school teachers get their heads tonsured
LUCKNOW: More than 50 teachers, including a woman, of unaided secondary schools affiliated with the UP Board got their heads tonsured at GPO Park in Lucknow on Wednesday to protest against the state government’s decision of discontinuing their honorarium.
The honorarium for over three lakh teachers of around 26,000 such unaided secondary schools was introduced by the Akhilesh Yadav government in 2016 after a sustained agitation by teachers under the banner of Uttar Pradesh Madhyamik Shikshak Sangh (Vit-Vihin).
However, the Yogi Adityanath government discontinued the provision, claimed protestors.
“When Akhilesh Yadav government had started giving us honorarium of Rs 1,000 with a promise of increasing the money gradually, the BJP leaders said the amount was meagre and looks like a charity. While they had promised to give a respectable honorarium when voted to power they actually discontinued it,” said Renu Mishra, who was one of the protesting teachers who tonsured her head at GPO.
Her photograph went viral on social media.
Mishra, who is the president of the women wing of Madhamik Sikshak Mahasangh (Vitvihin), said, “There are over three lakh teachers in 26,000 unaided secondary schools in UP and it is the students of these schools who secure merit in the UP Board examination. And yet the Yogi government says that teachers of such schools do not have any qualification.”
“If unaided school teachers are so useless then why does the education department take our services to evaluate board exam answer sheet. They must get copies evaluated by the government school teachers if they are more qualified than us,” association’s treasurer, Shiv Sarav Prasad said.“Today is the third day of our protest and no BJP minister has turned up to listen to our plight,” a protester said.
“It is a do or die situation for us, if the state government fails to fulfil our demands we will intensify our agitation,” said another teacher.
Earlier, in July 2018, hundreds of contractual teachers, including 50 women, got their heads tonsured and several Brahmins gave up their ‘janeu’ (sacred thread) in Lucknow on Wednesday in support of their demands of equal pay for equal work and regularisation of services.
Meanwhile, hundreds of contractual teachers, under the banner of Aam Shikshak/Shiksha Mitra Association, have also been staging a protest at Eco Garden in Alambagh area for last 69 days to draw the government’s attention towards their demands.