Dearth of lecturers mars government colleges

Shivani Bhakoo

Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, December 7

Out of the total 1873 sanctioned posts of lecturers in government colleges in the state, just 500 of them are regular teachers receiving all benefits. Besides, 250 are the part-time lecturers who are given lump sum salaries plus DA but no other benefits such as pension, medical leave and earned leave. The remaining 1100 are the guest faculty lecturers who are given lump sum salary and that too from the Parent Teacher Association (PTA) fund. In this sorry state of affairs, how can a government expect that quality education will be provided to the future generations?

Talking to The Tribune, Prof Jaipal Singh, retd senior lecturer from SCD Government College said, “There is unrest among the lecturers. How can we motivate the young generation to work hard when we ourselves are demotivated? Most of the PhD scholars are either sitting idle or are working on paltry salaries in government colleges. Why will they put their 100 percent and encourage the youngsters to opt teaching as their profession?,” rued Jaipal Singh.

The regular appointment of teachers has not been done since 1996-97. After that appointment has been of 10 or 12 regular teachers but not in proper batches as needed. “There has been exploitation of guest faculty lecturers in the government colleges. They recruit us on ad hoc basis, burden us with work without any benefits. Besides, we always feel insecure that our services can be terminated anytime. We can not motivate the students to opt teaching as profession because we ourselves are not satisfied,” said a guest faculty lecturer on the condition of anonymity.

The part-time and guest faculty lecturers rued that the pension of the retired government teachers would be three times more than our monthly salaries. “Government should at least compare what benefits are given to regular teachers and what are we getting. If not at par with them at least they should provide us reasonable salaries as we put more efforts, we are more energetic and equally efficient”, said another part-time lecturer.