Lapses in education system laid bare by student bodies
- The People's Chronicle Editorial :: November 26, 2022 -
WHILE it's quite common to hear about doctors working in government hospitals receiving perks from private healthcare facilities and government school teachers associating with private tuition centres during their non-working hours, it is probably for the first time that a teacher enjoying government salary has been rendering his teaching expertise in multiple private schools.
Even more interesting part is that the teacher in question, as claimed by Federal Students' Organisation, Kangleipak (FESOK), has never reported to work after joining the government service but is engaged as a guest lecturer in some private schools.
As Manipur had been periodically witnessing protests, often times marked by violence, by students demanding either revocation of transfer order of teachers in the middle of an academic session or shortage of teaching staff, the revelation by FESOK on Thursday during a media briefing that a particular teacher from Khurai Chingangbam Leikai posted at Wakan Upper Primary school under Saikul assembly constituency in Kangpokpi district was found working as a guest lecturer in some private schools underscores administrative lapses on the part of the department concerned.
Authority of the said school where the teacher is officially posted too owes an explanation as to how the protracted absence of the teacher from his place of posting went unnoticed. As per the claims made by FESOK vice president Ronald Kenedy Longjam, the teacher was appointed as a government teacher in 2012 and except for the day of joining the post at the Saikul school has been skipping duty for around 10 years.
Taking into account of the fact that the teacher has been missing from his place of posting, the head of the school is equally accountable for such scandalous conduct of the former.
Moreover, audacity of the teacher to continue receiving salary from the public funded School in the hill district as well as from reputed private schools implies either clandestine patronage of authority of his parent school or he has political backing, as is widely speculated in such cases.
While his service as a physics guest lecturer is notably valued by multiple private schools, it is rather tragic for students of the Wakan school to be deprived of such as an efficient guide.
The need for additional sources of compatible remuneration could be the driving force for the teacher to defy existing guidelines prescribed for all the government employees, but his act of nonchalantly neglecting the mandated task leaves no room for condoning, especially considering the fact that government schools have been a collective failure when it comes to imparting quality education.
Government school teachers' preference for suitable location of posting is widely known to all but in this case distance between the teacher's school and his residence shouldn't be much of an issue.
While only time will tell whether the government initiates punitive action against the teacher in question, it is heartening that student bodies including FESOK have been regularly carrying out inspection and highlighting infrastructural deficiencies and shortage of manpower, if any, in government educational institutions across the state.
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