In a decision set to benefit more than 9,000 state government employees, Punjab Cabinet on Monday approved a policy for regularising services of adhoc, contractual, and temporary teachers who have completed 10 years in service.
“Previously, various appointments to ‘Group C’ and ‘Group D’ level posts in government had been made on contract or temporary basis. Some of such employees have now put in a period of more than 10 years and had given their prime years of life in service of the state. The Cabinet opined that now at this stage, to relieve these employees will be unjustified and improper,” said the spokesperson after the meeting.
“Thus, being a welfare state and to protect the interest of these contractual temporary employees, the state government has formulated a policy for welfare of adhoc, contractual, and temporary teachers and other employees in the Education Department under Article 162 read with entry 41 of List-II of the Seventh Schedule of Constitution of India, to ensure that such employees do not suffer from uncertainty and harassment and to grant them a security of tenure,” added the spokesperson.
The state government has taken a policy decision to continue such desirous suitable teachers, who fulfil the eligibility conditions, in service till the age of 58 years by placing them in a special cadre. This policy, which will benefit more than 9,000 employees, has been framed only in relation to Group C and Group D posts of the state Education Department.
For regularization of services, an employee should have worked on adhoc, contractual, or temporary basis for a continuous period of minimum 10 years till the issuance of present policy and must have possessed the requisite qualifications and experience for the post in terms of rules, if any, at the time of placement in the Special Cadre.
The work and conduct of the applicant must have remained satisfactory as per the assessment of the department or employer during the period of 10 years service.
However, the policy will not be applicable to a person who has been engaged in an honorary capacity or on a part-time basis or had attained the age of superannuation or had resigned on his own or had not been retained by the Department or had been engaged on outsourced basis or is on an incentive based engagement or does not possess the requisite qualifications and experience for the post prescribed under the service rules, if any, at the time of placement in the Special Cadre or had been engaged or continues in service on account of any interim order(s), direction(s) of any Court or Tribunal; or had been convicted of any offence involving moral turpitude or charges have been framed against him in a Court of Law relating to such offence.
For the purpose of grant of continuation to these employees, they will be placed on a post, which shall not be a cadre post, by creating a special cadre of posts.
The process of placement of beneficiary employees will commence after submission of the Application Form, accompanied by all required documents, by him/her. The beneficiary employees, who are being placed in special cadre posts, will be allowed to continue in service till the age of 58 years. They will be treated as a fresh appointee.
Punjab to implement UGC pay scales for College, Univ teachers from Oct 1
Punjab Government will implement the University Grant Commission’s (UGC) pay scale, as per Seventh Pay Commission, for the teachers of colleges and universities.
“This was a long pending demand of the teachers, who had been eagerly waiting for this decision...This will come into force from October 1, 2022,” Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann said.
Striking an emotional chord with the teachers, Mann said that being the son of a teacher, he is well aware of the problems faced by them. He hoped that this would give a major relief to the teaching faculty in colleges and universities.
The Chief Minister also asserted that in order to impart quality higher education to the students, the State Government has decided to overcome the shortage of teachers in colleges by recruitment of guest faculty teachers. At the same time, he announced to enhance the honorarium of the guest faculty teachers.