Poor pay, quality products : Pvt school teachers paid a pittance
Source: The Sangai Express

Imphal, April 01 2015 : The monthly remuneration they receive is as different as the quality of students they produce each year.

While Government school teachers continue to draw a handsome salary, in the range of Rs 30,000 per month, their counter parts in the private schools get a measly amount of Rs 8,000 or so per month.

However the products they churn out every year are as different as chalk and cheese, an example that comes with force every year when the results of the HSLC and HSSLC exams are announced.

Speaking to The Sangai Express, a Government school teacher said that though the number of students passing the HSLC and HSSLC exams may have seen an appreciable increase down the years, the same cannot be said about the quality of education imparted to them.

A Social Science teacher in a Government high school located in Imphal East, on anonymity, stated that the number of students admitted in the school for the last three years has increased.

But the number of students who pass the HSLC exam from the school is negligible.

Primary school students outside their school

"There are about ten teachers in the school to teach 70 to 80 students.

This works out to about two classes per day.

Top up the light work load with the pay, which is more than Rs 30,000 per month and I feel like as if I am taking my salary for free," he said frankly.

This is in sharp contrast to the work of a private school teacher who has to put in more working hours each day and gets paid a pittance at the end of the month, he added.

This is precisely the reason why students from private schools are performing much better then their peers in Government run institutes, he observed.

Government school teachers are no doubt well trained but they do not discharge their duties diligently.

Speaking to this reporter, a teacher of a renowned private higher secondary school located in Imphal said that his salary is meagre and added that it is difficult to make both ends meet.

"I take about six classes each day and this works out to teaching 900 to 1000 students per day.

For all my hard work I get paid a pittance at the end of the month," he said and added that his monthly honorarium is just Rs 8000 .

When asked about the monthly fee and admission fees in private schools, he said that the admission fee could be anything higher than Rs 8,000 with a monthly fee of Rs 700.This is sans the school or school bus fees, he added.

Despite the poor pay, the students produced by the private schools have been besting the students from Government run schools, he added.

A primary school teacher in Imphal lucidly put it when she said that though she gets paid about Rs 27,000 per month her contribution towards moulding the young minds has been negligible.

"There are about ten teachers to teach about 80 students from class I to VIII.

This means that a teacher takes only two classes in a day but the products have always been found wanting," she added.

"It is little wonder then that no parents want to send their children to Government schools," she observed.

Another private school teacher stated that the monthly salary of a teacher is too low to meet the daily needs.

She gets paid only about Rs 4,500 per month.

She said, "The school has about 700 to 800 students and every teacher has to teach five classes a day but the pay just does not match up with the work load" .

Numerous private schools have sprouted in the State catering to the needs of numerous students, but no one has considered the hardships faced by the teachers, she opined.