Cong Cabinet decision revoked
Source: The Sangai Express
Imphal, June 25 2017:
Principal Secretary, Education (s) Vineet Joshi issued an order yesterday, revoking the Cabinet decision and the order passed by the Administrative Department to cancel the qualification scale of 1786 teachers during the time of the Congress Government led by O Ibobi Singh.
A Cabinet meeting held on August 20 last year had decided against qualification scale for 1786 teachers and the Administrative Department had
issued an order on September 6 regarding the matter.
According to a reliable source, there have been cases of numerous teachers not getting their pension due to AGD queries as many of the teachers, either knowingly orunknowingly, had been taking qualification scale.
There are also instances of the teachers challenging the Cabinet decision and the Administrative Department's order in Court, it added.
It pointed out that there have been earlier- cases of the Directorate of Education (S) giving high pay scale to under Matric teachers, Matriculate teachers, under graduate teachers and primary teachers, thereby resulting in various inconveniences at the service centres of the teachers.
In order to solve these inconveniences, a committee chaired by the Additional Chief Secretary (Finance) was constituted on February 21, 2014 with Principal Secretary, Education (S), Secretary (Law) and officials of Department of Personnel and Finance Department as members.
The report submitted by the committee contained details which sided with awarding qualification scale to the primary/ under graduate teachers and also recommended the teacher's posts to be urgraded according to their pay scale from the day of the qualification scale.
However a Cabinet meeting held on January 19, 2015 dismissed the recommendations and even advised the Administrative Department to file a petition to the High Court regarding the matter.
In the aftermath, the then Congress Government led by O Ibobi, on August 20, 2016, cancelled the State Cabinet's decision regarding the qualification scale of the 1786 teachers.
It explained that the All Manipur Elementary School Teachers Association filed a writ petition to the High Court of Manipur for cancelling the Cabinet decision (August 20,2016) and the Administrative Department's Order (September 6, 2016).Taking stock of the situation, the new State Government held a Cabinet meeting on April 28 to discuss the issue and the decisions taken by the previous Government and issued an order revoking the cancellation of the qualification scale of the teachers by the Cabinet of the previous Government.
It may be mentioned that the teachers have been taking up a fast unto death protest demanding the implementation of the Cabinet decision taken on April 28 .