Teachers suspend strike, class work resumed today
Teachers suspend strike, class work resumed today
Srinagar : The teachers association of Saint Josephs’ Higher Secondary School (SJHSS) Baramulla has suspended its strike and will resume the routine class work from Friday.
The development comes after the teachers were given assurances by the outgoing Deputy Commissioner Baramulla Bhupinder Kumar that their genuine grievances and demands will be fulfilled within two to three weeks.
Earlier, the school management had decided to extend the Eid Holidays in view of the academic disruptions at the institution.
“ We met the Deputy Commissioner Baramulla today to put forth our demands. After giving a patient hearing, the deputy commissioner assured us that or demands will be fulfilled once the school principal will return from abroad,” one of the staff members told media persons during the peaceful protest organized inside the school premises. Notably the school principal has gone for holidays to abroad.
“ On basis of the assurances of DC sahib, we are suspending our strike and will resume class work from tomorrow (Friday),” he said.
As already reported, the class work at Saint Joseph’s school was suspended from last Saturday from kindergarten to higher secondary level classes following the strike by the teachers against the school management for not fulfilling their genuine demands.
“ Our grievances are about denial in salary hike, delay in issuance of confirmation orders in favour teachers recruited some 20 years ago. They are still on probation,” the staff member said.
Over the years, the school would not charge any tuition fee from the wards of teachers studying in the school. However, from this year the management has decided to charge 50 percent fee from the teachers enrolled in the school.
As already reported, the teachers complained that the management had been denying them the routine annual hike in their salaries since the COVID-19 outbreak with the school administration recently announcing only a nominal hike, which was unacceptable to the staff.
The teachers also complained that the administration had also withheld the arrears to them. They alleged that the school principal is evading responsibility by "deliberately being out of station".
“ The school collected whole tuition fee during Covid19 pandemic times besides collected donation from parents at the time of new admissions without even giving any receipt to it. But they deny salary hike to the staff,” a teacher complained.
Besides the teaching staff, all other staff was also on strike over the highhandedness of the school management.
