The association of the guest teachers has decided to restart its agitation from August 17. The office bearers and the district heads of the association met at Gandhi Park in the State capital on Sunday and decided to restart a massive agitation.
The Vice President of the association, Harish Chandra Arya told The Pioneer that the Uttarakhand High Court (HC) in its recent decision has said that the guest teachers can be appointed in the schools of the State till March 2017 only.
“It appears that the State Government has decided to implement the order of HC and restrict our service which is unacceptable to all of us. We want that the Government should challenge the order and ensure that the services of guest teachers are renewed every year,’’ he said.
The members of the association are angry over the attitude of the state education minister Mantri Prasad Naithani who despite claiming to be sympathetic with the cause of guest teachers has maintained a silence on the issue. The members of the association now plan to initiate a massive agitation which according to them would be much bigger in scale than the one organised in the month of April.
The education department had employed 6,214 guest teachers on purely temporary basis against the vacant posts of lecturers and lecturer Teachers (lT) in the Government schools last year. On March 31 this year the department terminated their contract following which these teachers started an agitation.
Education Minister Mantri Prasad Naithani even sat on a hunger strike in support of the agitating guest teachers during the President’s rule. When the Congress Government was restored in the State, it passed a GO for reinstatement of these teachers.
This GO was contested in the court which rendered the entire process of recruitment of guest teachers as unconstitutional.