The Education Department’s order that the teachers should stay within a distance of eight kilometres from the schools they are posted is meeting strong resistance from the teaching community.
On the orders of the State Education Minister Arvind Pandey, the Department recently asked teachers and employees that they should reside near their place of their posting.
large number of teachers and other employees of Education Department commute long distances daily to reach their schools and return back to their homes daily. Termed ‘Up and Down’ in popular parlance many teachers commute up to 100-130 kms daily to reach their place of posting. Taking strong exception to this practice, the Director General (DG) Education, Captain Alok Shekhar Tiwari (rtd) asked the Department officials to put an end this practice.
He said this practice apart from being wrong also comes under financial irregularity as teachers/ employees receive house rent allowance for the place they are posted in. The department has also initiated a process to identify such teachers who don’t stay near place of their posting.
The teachers, however, are not impressed by the department’s argument on the issue. All teacher organisations have termed the order unnecessary. General secretary of Rajkeeya Shikshak Sangh (RSS), the Association of Government School lecturers and lecturer teachers (lT), Sohan Singh Majila said that the Department’s order was not relevant.
He said that order of staying within a distance of eight kilo meters was of a time when the transport facility and road infrastructure were not developed like now.
He further pointed out that the Department has installed bio metric system of attendance in almost all schools and if the teachers and coming and leaving the schools on time than it is foolhardy to ask where they are staying.
One of a female teachers posted in a remote village located in Raipur block of Dehradun district said, “Yes I commute for about forty five kms daily from Dehradun to reach my school as I cannot live in the sparsely populated village. There are many others like me. We have to take care of our families too and further who would guarantee our safety if we stay there. We reach the school on time and perform our duties to best of our capability. Making long distance commutation daily takes a toll on our health but there is no other option.’’
It is worth mentioning here that thousands of private taxi operators in the State are directly dependent on teachers and other Government employees who commute long distances daily to make a living. The teachers undertake long daily travel from all major cities and towns of the State.