HYDERABAD, Feb 23: The Mehran Elementary and Secondary Teachers Association has decided to launch a protest movement across Sindh if its 17-point charter of demands was not accepted by the government.

The decision was taken at a meeting of the association on Sunday with president Qasim Pathan in the chair. The MESTA secretary-general, Ismail Leghari, said in a statement that teachers had exhausted their patience as the government had not only failed to issue a notification about the already accepted demands but also gone back on its promises.

Mr Leghari said the meeting had decided that if the 17-point charter of demands was not accepted by Feb 25, the association would launch a protest movement from Feb 26.

He said thousands of teachers would stage a protest demonstration and stage sit-in outside the Hyderabad Press Club on Feb 26. The charter of demands includes restoration of 25 per cent teachers' children employment quota, abolition of contract system, grant of selection grade and move-over, appointment of headmasters and headmistresses on the vacant posts on the basis of seniority, full medical cover on the pattern of federal government employees and grant of house rent in accordance with the new pay scale.

It demanded that teachers under going professional training should be given study leave with full pay, a separate organization should look after the benevolent fund of teachers, uniformity should be maintained in rural and urban allowances and all the retrenched women teachers should be reinstated.

Meanwhile, the Government Secondary Teachers' Association, city chapter, on the call of the central leadership decided to stage a protest demonstration on Tuesday against the non-acceptance of teachers' demands.

The association's press release said all the elementary and high school teachers would participate in the protest demonstration.