Principals unhappy with new directive

Ravinder Saini

Tribune News Service

Jhajjar, September 22

The recent directive/clarification issued by the Higher Education Department regarding engagement of extension (guest) lecturers to meet the shortage of regular staff in government colleges across the state has disappointed college principals. They have described it as ‘illogical’ and ‘useless’.

The college principals say the directive will not serve the purpose of meeting the acute shortage of lecturers in colleges, as nothing new and meaningful has been mentioned in it. They have been eagerly waiting for a clarification regarding re-engagement of unqualified teachers, who have worked earlier, for an immediate solution to the problem.

Sources say the department has fixed preference to engage extension lectures to meet the workload required for the 2017-18 academic session. According to the preference, the workload will first be met through regular faculty and, if required, those eligible candidates, who have worked earlier, maybe allowed to continue.

“Thereafter, displaced eligible extension lectures maybe reengaged on merit. If the workload is still not met, retired teachers maybe allowed to work as extension lecturers, according to the existing policy. If the workload is still available, eligible extension lectures maybe engaged for science subjects as a last resort,” states the new directive.

A college principal says the new directive is not logical, as eligible candidates are not available for science and some other subjects of the arts stream. Hence, it is not feasible to meet the staff shortage in the given situation.

“All eligible extension lecturers are working as usual. Hence, a new directive in this regard makes no sense. Why retired teachers will work for a whole day at a remuneration of Rs 25,000 per month! Even the number of retired teachers is nominal as compared to vacant posts across the state. Displaced teachers cannot be reengaged as regular teachers have replaced them. Hence, there is no workload available for displaced ones,” says another principal.

Yet another college principal suggests re-engagement of unqualified teachers is the only solution to meet the workload in the present conditions. Hence, the department should go for it. Notably, unqualified candidates were earlier engaged as extension lecturers to cope with the shortage of regular faculty. But this session, the department decided not to engage them, resulting in an acute staff crunch in the colleges.