Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Sept 13: Former minister and senior Congress leader Raman Bhalla today alleged that Jammu region suffered a lot after the formation of BJP-PDP Govt in the State.
While addressing protesting teachers at Press Club Jammu here Bhalla expressed solidarity with them. He said thousands of teachers in the State, hired under the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA), are on an indefinite strike to protest against the Government for adopting delaying tactics in implementing benefits of the 7th Pay commission to them and delinking their salaries from the component paid by the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development.
“It has been 15-days since these teachers went on indefinite strike and some of them are on hunger strike, but the Government, it seems, is not bothered to solve their long pending demands. Though in the past five months, the Government constituted several committees to look for measures to address their issues, nothing has been finalized till now, which has forced them to go on agitational path, ” Bhalla added.
“The best way to end the crisis is to regularize all SSA teachers as General Line Teachers so that the problem gets solved once for all. Due to the strike not only students are suffering, but teachers are being humiliated everyday on roads,” he added.
While urging the Governor led State Government to fulfill the demands of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) teachers at the earliest, Bhalla said it is unfortunate that nation builders are being forced to come on roads to demand their dues.
While the Teacher’s Day was celebrated across schools in Jammu and Kashmir and other parts of the country on September 5, it was unfortunate that thousands of teachers in the state, hired under the SSA, were forced to go on an indefinite strike to protest against the government for adopting “delaying” tactics in implementing 7th Pay Commission, Bhalla said.
“Hundreds of SSA teachers are sitting on hunger strike and the Government must start immediate negotiations with them,” he added.
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