No breakthrough yet in teachers' stir
Source: The Sangai Express
Imphal, February 19 2019:
Even though representatives of SSA and RMSA teachers who have been on indefinite cease work strike since February 4 held a meeting with Education Minister Th Radheshyam today, the two sides could not come to any understanding.
On account of the cease work strike launched under the aegis of the Joint SSA and RMSA Teachers' Association, teaching activities have been severely affected at schools where the SSA and RMSA teachers are posted.
Starting from 2011, SSA and RMSA teachers were recruited on regular basis in different phases but they have not been paid their salaries for the past 7/8 months.
The primary demands of the SSA and RMSA teachers are payment of monthly salaries regularly and creation of promotion avenue.
After a first round of meeting was held on February 4, a second meeting was held between Education Minister Th Radheshyam and the Joint SSA & RMSA Teachers' Association at the former's Secretariat North Block office at, around 5 pm today.
Even though the meeting lasted for almost one hour, the Government did not give any assurance to fulfil or address the teachers' demands except for acknowledging their woes.
The Education Minister was only asking the teachers to wait for some time, informed a source.
Taking serious note of the adverse impacts caused by the cease work strike in many schools, the Government officials appealed to the teachers to withdraw their strike but the teachers expressed keen desire to sign a memorandum of understanding first on the steps taken up/to be taken up by the Government to address their demands, conveyed the source.
However, the State Government was unwilling to sign any such MoU.
Taking strong exception to the Government's appeal to withdraw the agitation while it was not ready to sign any MoU, the teachers who took part in the meeting came out of the Minister's office without saying anything, according to the source.
Some teachers said that they went to the meeting as invited by the Education Director with a big hope but the Government showed little concern for the teachers.
Asserting that the Government's attitude was rather humiliating, the teachers said that they would hold a meeting and discuss about further intensifying the ongoing agitation.
The meeting held today was also participated by Education (S) Commissioner H Deleep Singh, Education (S) Director Th Kirankumar, Education (S) Joint Secretary L Nandakumar and SSA ASPD Phulen Meitei.
Notably, the agitating teachers have already submitted a representation to the authorities concerned not to assign them any duty for the HSLC Exam 2019 and HSE 2018 as well as the Lok Sabha election 2019.The teachers have locked offices of ZEOs and DIs located in different districts and they have been staging sit-in-protest in front of these offices every day.