The agitation by the 1.72 lakh Shiksha Mitra (para-teachers) following the quashing of their appointment as assistant teachers by the Allahabad high court on September 12 threatens to snowball into a major crisis for the UP government as they have given the call to `March’ to Varanasi to ghearo the prime minister Narendra Modi. PM will be on day long visit to his lok Sabha constituency on September 18 to inaugurate Integrated Power Development Scheme at DlW grounds in Varanasi and lay foundation stone for a ring road project.
UP Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Wednesday appealed to the Shiksha Mitras on war path to call off their agitation and assured them the government will do its best to work an amicable solution to the crisis faced by the teachers following the high court order.
Meanwhile the state government is yet to receive the certified copy of the order of the high court. ``We are waiting for the order; it is yet to be uploaded on the website of the high court. The order was issued on Saturday, it was a long order and it usually takes 2-3 days’’, said Dinesh Babu Sharma, director of the basic education.
Jitendra Shahi, leader of the Shiksha Mitra joint front said here on Wednesday that ``We want to meet the prime minister to apprise him of the crisis of the monumental scale faced by the 1.72 lakh teachers and their families following the September 12 order of the Allahabad high court which quashed the regularization of Shiksha Mitra (para teachers) as assistant teachers’’. He claimed that there is no plan to gherao the prime minister but `` we will certainly want to stage protest in front of the PM as the Center’s national council of Teachers education (NCTE) was responsible for the adverse order of the high court’’.
The leader of the para teachers warned that the state government will be solely responsible for any untoward incident if any attempt is made by the authorities to prevent them from reaching Varanasi or any repressive measures are adopted by the government to crush the agitation. He said that the para teachers have started reaching Varanasi along with their family members and thousands of others are on their way. Four different organizations of the para teachers have merged to form a joint front to spearhead the struggle for justice.
The teaching work in over 1.68 lakh state run primary schools remained paralysed for third consecutive day as the para teachers boycotted the classes and staged protest demonstrations at the district headquarters across the state. They also submitted a memorandum addressed to the Union HRD minister Smriti Irani, to the district magistrates. On Wednesday in several districts police had a tough time to control the irate teachers and used mild force to control the situation.
Meanwhile the chief minister Akhilesh Yadav appealed to the agitating Shiksha Mitras to end their strike and assured them for an amicable solution very soon. Talking to reporters here, CM said that government had fulfilled its promise to regularize the service of the shiksha mitras in primary schools as assistant teachers and it will do everything possible to protect their interests. He appealed to Shiksha Mitras to end their agitation as the state government was doing whatever required.
CM, who attended a photo exhibition at the lalit Kala Academy here, said the Shiksha Mitras should not be disappointed by the HC order. ``If without TET teachers can be appointed in other states then why it cannot be done in UP’’, said the CM.
Meanwhile, Shiksha Mitra Joint front leader Jitendra Shahi has rejected the appeal of the CM and has refused to withdraw their agitation on the CM’s appeal.” We will continue the agitation till our services are not regularised’’.
Meanwhile the state BJP came out in the support of the para teachers and shot a letter to the Union HRD minister. The BJP legislature party leader Suresh Kumar Khanna said in his letter that the para teachers were appointed during the BJP rule in UP in 1998 under the 1Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaa’, scheme initiated by the then NDA government at the Center. Seeking immediate intervention of the Union minister he said the Center should take immediate measures prevent the crisis before 1.72 lakh teachers from worsening.