HARIPUR, July 28: The executive district officer (EDO) Haripur has terminated services of 15 women teachers for being absent from duty for the last two years. According to the termination order, one of the dismissed teachers had not been attending school since April 2000, four of them since September 2001, one since September 2003, four since September 2004, two since 2005 and one such teacher since January 2006.

Before imposing the major penalty of dismissal from the service under Article 8-A of the Efficiency and Discipline Rules 1973 and Special Powers 2000, the department had issued them show cause notices individually and their names were notified through newspapers advertisements but all of them failed to resume duties, says the termination letter.

Meanwhile, some of the terminated teachers, when approached for comments, termed the action political victimisation and said they had decided to move the court against this decision.

They argued that if they were not attending duties for such a long time why predecessor EDOs did not take action against them.