BENGALURU: Guest lecturers serving in government first-grade colleges across the state seem to be left in the lurch — they have been on dharna for 20 days, but even opposition parties have failed to take up their demands in the session. They are likely to intensify their strike and student organisations SFI and ABVP will take up their issue and hit the streets soon, sources said.
Interestingly, the previous BJP government has addressed one of their demands by increasing their honorarium from Rs 13,000 to Rs 32,000 and increasing their workload from eight hours a week to 15 hours.
Except for a few BJP MLCs who met the office-bearers of the guest faculty, Opposition leader R Ashoka is yet to take note of the issue. Over 12,372 lecturers who were working in 430 colleges are on strike, demanding regularisation of their services, as the Congress had promised to take up their demand and even mentioned it in its poll manifesto.
“As LoP, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah had raised the issue, following which the Congress included it in its election manifesto. Now, Siddaramaiah is keeping mum and opposition parties are also not raising the issue,” remarked Dr Dharmaveera KH, an office-bearer of the guest faculty association. The government can bring in an amendment to the cadre and recruitment rules to absorb the guest faculty, as New Delhi and Haryana have done. Over 4,000 are eligible with PhD, NET and MPhil degrees, he added.
“There is a provision as the Supreme Court passed an order in the Karnataka government versus Umadevi case on April 10, 2006,” association president Dr Hanumanthagouda R Kalmani said. He told TNIE that Higher Education Minister Dr M C Sudhakar had promised to take steps after consulting the finance and law departments when they had staged a rally in Belagavi on December 7. If the state government absorbs the 4,000 eligible guest faculty, it will not be burdened as the UGC will take care of their salaries, said Kalmani. The guest faculty strike that started on November 23, has reportedly affected over 15 lakh students and disturbed the academic cycle.
Some universities are likely to defer examinations of odd semesters and this could also affect the next academic year. In an attempt to pacify the guest faculty, the minister held a meeting with higher education department officials on Tuesday. “Principals of all government colleges and polytechnics of the state have been instructed to allow guest lecturers to work as per rules, without any discrimination,” Sudhakar posted on X.