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LAHORE, Jan 30: Scores of schoolteachers will march towards the Punjab Assembly chambers on Tuesday (today) for not meeting their demands.
Punjab Teachers Action Committee chairman Hafiz Abdul Nasir told Dawn on Monday that teachers from across the province would boycott classes and gather at the Nasser Bagh to attend the protest rally.
He said schools should be governed by provinces instead of district governments and services of contract teachers should be reqularized. Armymen should not be appointed in school monitoring teams, and notices issued to the teachers for poor performance must be withdrawn as it was not their fault alone.
He said the education department’s new policy of ‘mar nahee pyar’ was creating discipline problems. He said the schools handed over to the NGOs should be taken back immediately.
SUPPORT: The Muttahida Labour Federation has supported the demands of teachers and urged the government to accept them instead of compelling them to resort to protest.
Chief organizer Muhammad Yaqoob said at a meeting held here on Monday with Altaf Baloch in the chair that teachers should be given due respect and good pay and allowances because they were responsible for the education of the new generation.
He said the teachers of government schools should be paid attractive salaries like their colleagues in the private sector.
Federation secretary-general Hanif Ramay criticized the policy of depriving the teachers of pension and gratuity benefits, and said they would not be able to discharge their duties with peace of mind as a result.
He said the federation supported the demands of the teachers and the workers would participate in their protest on Tuesday to express solidarity with them.
