AIZAWL: More than 1000 Hindi teachers employed under Centrally Sponsored Schemes (CSS) in Mizoram schools were continuing with their sit-in demonstration in front of the Chief Minister's Office since yesterday. The protest, demanding that the chief minister take up the matter with the Centre, continued despite rains throughout the night.
Leaders of the Hindi Teachers Association said that 1,305 High School and Middle School Hindi teachers appointed under the CSS were not paid their salaries for ten months and their services were likely to be terminated from February end unless the Centre decides otherwise. The leaders said that they will continue with their sit-in programme in front of the chief minister's office-sum-residence till Saturday. If they do not get "good news" by then, they will decide their next course of action, the leaders said.
Besides the sit-in demonstration, the teachers had launched pen-down strike last week and taken out a protest rally in Aizawl on Tuesday. Meanwhile, state School Education department officials clarified that the Hindi teachers have been employed by the Union Ministry of Human Resources Development and their salaries are paid by the Union HRD ministry and not by the state government.
School Education Minister H. Rohluna, accompanied by Parliamentary Secretary Joseph Lalhimpuia, had met the Union HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar in New Delhi on October 26 last and also met ministry officials a number of times while chief minister Lal Thanhawla had sent DO letters to the Prime Minister, two times on the issue. "Continuation of the services of the Hindi teachers will be decided by the Centre in accordance with the recommendations of Lucknow-based Awadh Foundation, which has been entrusted with evaluating the scheme under which the Hindi teachers were employed", the officials said.