Can''t recommend that only teachers will get benefits: VC

Bhartesh Singh Thakur

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, December 16

The Panjab University Senate today passed Rs 556.38 crore budget for 2018-19. However, there is no provision for the 7th Pay Commission recommendations for teachers.

“The Centre has notified the 7th Pay Commission. This time, there would be lesser support to states for paying salaries and also for lesser period. They would contribute 50 per cent of the enhanced salaries and 30 per cent of the arrears. “The MHRD says that for us, the state is Punjab,” said Prof Arun Kumar Grover, Vice-Chancellor, Panjab University.

“In the high court, the Centre has submitted that they would pay salaries to teachers and non-teaching staff in the ratio of 1:1.1 but the Punjab Government has to notify the 7th Pay Commission. The UT Administration also couldn’t release the money for the Pay Commission, unless Punjab notifies it,” he added.

He told the Senate that the MHRD/UGC would have to pay Rs 35 crore more every year and Punjab would have to pay Rs 22 crore more every year for the implementation of the 7th Pay Commission in the PU.

Senator Dr Gurmeet Singh said the only solution to financial woes should be to turn the PU into a central varsity and Haryana and Himachal should be enjoined to press the Centre for it.

“Haryana colleges need to be affiliated to PU”

“Both Governors of Punjab and Haryana have thought that to meet the higher educational needs of this region, colleges here need to be affiliated to Panjab University. The government colleges in Panchkula and Mohali are not affiliated to the PU,” said Prof Grover. He added that the PU should have a corpus of Rs 100-200 crore so  that salary crisis at the start and end of the year didn’t arise.

Dr Urmi Kessar Memorial Lecture on Jan 8

Noted novelist and poet Vikram Seth will deliver second Dr Urmi Kessar Memorial Lecture on January 8, 2018. A honarium of Rs 5 lakh will be paid to Seth. Chairperson of the Department of English and Cultural Studies Rumina Sethi will be interlocutor during the interaction with Seth. 

Discussion on 7th Pay Commission  

Prof Rajesh Gill, president, Panjab University Teachers' Association (PUTA), said, “The condition that we have to wait till the Punjab Government notifies the 7th Pay Commission is not acceptable to us. It should be intimated to the UGC/MHRD.”

Prof Grover asked, "Do we have resources to pay the 7th Pay Commission benefits?"

Prof Gill replied, “In the court case, we should make an argument that when salaries are being paid by the MHRD/UGC, we should be declared as central university.”

"The Supreme Court has defined us as inter-state corporate body. Sloganeering is something else," said Prof Grover.

Prof Navdeep Goyal, chairperson of the Physics Department, intervened and said, “Even during the Board of Finance (BoF) meeting, we raised the point where it was written that Punjab had to notify the 7th Pay Commission first, and only then PU teachers would get the enhanced salaries. I checked the calendar, it is nowhere written. No paper has been shown to us.”

“I can't recommend that teachers should get the 7th Pay Commission benefits and non-teaching staff should not,” said Prof Grover. For a majority of non-teaching staff, the Punjab Government has to notify the pay commission as salaries from the Centre would come for 1,378 teachers and equal number of non-teaching staff.