PESHAWAR: Adviser to the chief minister on higher education Mushtaq Ghani on Monday announced that departmental action would be taken against the college teachers, who demonstrated against the provincial government outside the mansion of ruling PTI’s chairman Imran Khan in Islamabad.

During a news conference here, the adviser said the Banigala protest by teachers was politically-motivated and the government would take action against protesters.

“The college teachers are doing so at the behest of politicians,” he said without naming names.

The teachers of public sector colleges across the province have protested the introduction of reforms since last month claiming the move is meant to privatise their educational institutions. They demonstrated in Banigala on Monday evening.

Chief Minister Pervez Khattak had met teachers few days ago and announced withdrawal of the decision to form board of governors in colleges but the teachers didn’t end their protest demanding professional allowance and one-step scale upgradation.

Mr Ghani denied the ‘selloff’ of colleges and said the government was not going to burden the students of public sector colleges and all fears and allegations in that respect were baseless.

“If teachers don’t rejoin duty the day after tomorrow, we will take departmental action against them,” he warned before requesting protesters not to boycott classes as ‘it doesn’t suit them’.

The adviser said he requested teachers to join duties as their fears about the privatisation of public sector colleges were baseless.

He said in the past, political influence was used for the appointment of vice-chancellors to public sector universities in the province.

Mr Ghani said the teachers protesting the government’s decisions and demanding allowances were on the streets at the behest of politicians.

He said the provincial government had already withdrawn its decision to form board of governors at its colleges but couldn’t meet the teachers’ demand on allowance and scale upgradation.

“If the higher education department approves this allowance, employees of other government departments too will demand the same and therefore, the meeting of that demand is not possible,” he said.

The adviser said the provincial government gave teachers a choice to hold talks with the government to resolve the issue but the latter had unreasonably gone to Banigala to demonstrate.

“Let them (teachers) be happy with that if that is what they wanted. However, the government will take action against protesting teachers,” he said.

Published in Dawn, October 17th, 2017