RAWALPINDI, Sept 20: The Punjab government has promoted eight lecturers (BPS-17) to the rank of assistant professor (BPS-18) in different colleges of Rawalpindi.

This has been one of the long-standing demand of the Ittehad-i-Assataza Pakistan (IAP).

According to a notification issued by the Punjab education department, as many as 106 lecturers, serving in grade 17 for the last so many years, were promoted to grade 18 as assistant professors. Out of the total, eight lecturers are serving in colleges in Rawalpindi.

Two lecturers are from Gordon College; three from Govt Postgraduate College, Asghar Mall; two from Govt Islamia Hashmat Ali College and one from Govt Degree College, Satellite Town.

The IAP union leaders have appreciated the government’s decision. This will go a long way in removing the growing resentment prevailing among the college teachers who were eagerly waiting for their promotion for a long time, the IAP Rawalpindi president, Zulfiqar Haider Malik, said.

The IAP leaders have asked Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali to order the education authorities to allow 15 per cent pay raise to teachers recently appointed on contract basis.