KARACHI, Aug 8: The Sindh Professors and Lecturers Association (SPLA) has urged the government to appoint college teachers under a crash programme to overcome the teachers shortage in city colleges, which is likely to deepen further in the wake of the opening of eight new degree colleges in the new session.
Speaking at a press conference on Thursday, the leaders of the major college teachers body in the province stated that 100-150 teachers were being retired after reaching to the age of superannuation every year, but no matching replacements were being made in the colleges, while new colleges would certainly need hundreds of teaching and non-teaching staff.
The point put forward was that since the public service commission was failing to select teachers in adequate number for postings in colleges, it would be appropriate that teachers already working as cooperative teachers be appointed at colleges soon, otherwise the posting of teachers on detailment at the new colleges would surely hamper the teaching process at these colleges, which are already operational but faced with a teacher shortage. They suggested that cooperative teachers, or those likely to be hired on contract should be given a salary at least equal to grade 17 of teachers salary.
The SPLA Sindh President, Prof Sirajuddin Qazi and former all-Pakistan President, Reaz Ahsan, addressed the press conference, maintaining that the authorities were indifferent towards teachers problems, and that was why many of the genuine demands of the body went unheeded. They said that if their demands were not fulfilled latest by Aug 24, then teachers would resort to holding protest meetings and rallies throughout the province from Aug 25.
They opposed the denationalization plan pertaining to nationalized educational institutions, and demanded for its immediate withdrawal as, according to the SPLA, it was anti-people and anti-education. They also urged the government that senior officers of grade 20 of the education department be posted as executive district officer (education) at Karachi, Sukkur and Hyderabad.
Teachers also noted that recommendations of the task force were not in the interest of the public sector seats of higher learning, therefore the government should abolish the existing steering committee on higher education and institute another body involving teachers, vice-chancellors and other academicians of the public sector.
The SPLA leaders criticized the education secretary of Sindh, and observed that his adventurism was the reason behind the unrest in teachers and the failure of certain government policies. They felt that recent training of newly appointed college lecturers at NIPA was an utter waste of huge government funds. NIPA is meant for administrative training and not for any academic training, and that too of teachers, they added.
