HYDERABAD: With State universities not responding to the demand for hiked remuneration, it seems the contractual and part-time teachers have to still wait long for the order to be issued.
The State government had issued GO MS 11 a month ago for increasing the salaries of contractual faculty and part-time teachers of 11 State universities by 75 per cent. The decision to jack up the pay of 1,500 contract professors and almost 600 part-time teachers in the State had come following the recommendation of Prof Tirupathi Rao committee, which was constituted after months of protests by the teachers.
However, teachers allege that varsities lack the willingness to implement the GO, as a result, no order has been issued by any of the State universities.
Consider this: the assistant professors and part-time lecturers of Osmania University claim to have met the vice-chancellor at least a dozen times post the GO. However, every meeting received the same response: "Wait for some time, wait for Executive Council (EC) meeting for approval."
Osmania University EC consists of-- vice-chancellor, registrar along with finance department secretary and special chief secretary for education-- as it members. The body convenes a meeting once in four months.
According to officials, the meeting has been delayed this time as the special chief secretary Ranjeev R Acharya is on leave.
"The decision to enhance the remuneration was taken last November and the GO was released in April, which means the bureaucrats were in the know of things. So, EC's approval is a mere formality. What we have suggested is that OU should issue an anticipatory approval order and later get the official approval from the EC," said Prof Ch Parandamulu, sociology department, and a member of Osmania University Contractual Teachers Association (OU CAP).
No clarity on implementation of GO
In addition, there is barely any clarity on the date of implementation of the GO has also given the universities a free hand. According to the GO, the revised pay will be applicable from November 1, 2017 but it doesn't specify by when the formalities have to be over.
"How long do we have to wait? Six months have already passed and still there is no word on the implementation of the GO. On May 14, we submitted another representation to the VC seeking issuance of pay slips and an additional amount of `3,000 for PhD holders," said Dr A Thirupathaiah from department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry, Mahatma Gandhi University in Nalgonda.
The assistant professor added that instead of enhancing their salaries, MGU was terminating the contracts of teachers. A memo issued by the university on May 15 stated that 52 academic consultants in the University College of Engineering and in the three constituent colleges would be in service till the last date of the current academic year — May 31 and May 19-- respectively.
The communique, however, states that such faculty will be re-appointed and reinstated on contract basis at the commencement of the new academic session in June.
Speculation is rife that state universities might not be able to implement the salary enhancement. "Barring Osmania University, all State universities were given meagre funding this year. Unless there is some financial aid from the government to meet this additional expenditure, several universities will find it difficult to implement the GO," said an official on condition of anonymity.