News from The Telegraph Pay delay at special schools SUBHAJOY ROY
Chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s promise to disburse schoolteachers’ salaries on the first of each month has failed to change the fortunes of 1,200 teachers and non-teaching employees at schools for children with special needs. For the past two decades, these teachers — who are specially trained to cater to deaf, mute and visually and mentally challenged children — have been getting their salaries once every two to three months. The problem started in the mid-1990s, with the decision by the state government to segregate the special schools and bring them under the mass education department. “Before that, we were part of the technical education department and used to receive salaries on time,” said Amiya Satpati, the principal of Lighthouse For The Blind. On June 4, the chief minister had promised that all schoolteachers would be brought under the school education department. “We have written to the chief minister, requesting her to bring the alternative schools under the school education department. We at the deaf and mute schools follow the same course as prescribed by the state secondary education board,” said Promit Chowdhury, a teacher at the Calcutta Deaf and Dumb School in Garpar. There are 75 schools in the state that impart education to children with special needs. “This is a problem that plagues all such schools of the state,” said a teacher of Bodhi Peet, a school for mentally challenged students. “We are yet to receive the salaries for April and May,” said Mallika Goswami, who also teaches at the Calcutta Deaf and Dumb School. “The memo to disburse the salaries has arrived. Now, we have to undergo a complicated process to receive the salary.” Not only salaries, the funds required to run the schools are also released at irregular intervals. “Many of our students stay at the hostel. Running the hostel often becomes difficult if funds do not arrive on time,” said Satpati. Even the Puja bonuses for teachers and non-teaching employees are disbursed after six months. “We received the Puja bonus for 2010 with our January-March salary in April,” said Goswami. Mass education minister Abdul Karim Chowdhury said his department was keen to solve the problem. “As of now, however, I am not sure whether these schools will be included under the school education department,” the minister said. After a departmental meeting last week, it was decided in principle to regularise the staff salaries. “But the process will take at least a couple of months,” said an official. Some of the teachers met Trinamul leader and Union minister Mukul Roy last week. “He said we will receive feedback in a fortnight. He also promised to take our grievances to the proper place,” said Goswami. [image: Top]<http://www.telegraphindia.com/1110622/jsp/calcutta/story_14108287.jsp#top> Search for old postings at: http://www.mail-archive.com/accessindia@accessindia.org.in/ To unsubscribe send a message to accessindia-requ...@accessindia.org.in with the subject unsubscribe. To change your subscription to digest mode or make any other changes, please visit the list home page at http://accessindia.org.in/mailman/listinfo/accessindia_accessindia.org.in
