Teachers welcome AAP's declaration of 25,000 jobs

Aparna Banerji

Jalandhar, March 20

While welcoming the decision of the AAP government to fill 25,000 posts in various government departments, the unemployed government employees’ fraternity has raised more questions.

Of the 25,000 government posts released by the AAP, 10,000 are for police personnel. We want to know how many of the remaining 15,000 are meant for the Education Department? We welcome the AAP’s decision. But we are waiting until the government’s swearing-in process to be completed. Then we will raise our demands as well. Deepak Thakur, leader of BEd TET Pass Unemployed Teachers’ Union

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While the state was witness to some very intense protests by unemployed teachers and employees until days before the election code of conduct (for the 2022 poll) was implemented, the same unemployed employed and teachers now demand to know how many jobs will they get among the newly announced posts announced by the state’s new government.

Key employees who held protests right before the elections in Jalandhar, included the BEd TET Pass Unemployed Union, ETT Union, teachers of various sports positions and health workers. While overall over 50,000 unemployed employees demand jobs in various government departments, teachers said they hope the government will soon make a declaration regarding them too.

Deepak Thakur, leader of the BEd TET Pass Unemployed Teachers’ Union, said, “Of the 25,000 government posts released by the AAP, 10,000 are for police personnel. We want to know how many of the remaining 15,000 are meant for the Education Department?”

“We welcome the AAP’s decision. But we are waiting until the government’s swearing in process to be completed. Then we will raise our demands as well. With the coming of the AAP government, the process of filling posts which were released by the outgoing Congress government, was also stalled. Of those posts, 10,000 were for police personnel and the remaining 10,000 to 12,000 were for teachers. We don’t know the status of those posts yet so we would like the present government to come clear on that too. Also while the age for applying for a job in neigbouring states has been increased to 42, we also want the Punjab government should increase it to 42. We have spent our lives demanding jobs. Many of us have aged as we have been awaiting jobs for years,” he said.

Jagseer Pradhan, member of the 873 Unemployed DPE Union, said, “There are over 50,000 unemployed government employees who are members of unions fighting for their rights. They include DPEs, PTIs, Multipurpose Health Workers, Contractual employees, etc. The government’s declaration of 25,000 government jobs is welcome. But a declaration on all these unions is awaited. We have all waited long for jobs.”

Notably, while unions say there are over 50,000 unemployed employees in the state, these include members of the following unemployed unions – PTI Union (546), DPE Union (873), B.ED TET Pass (15 – 16,000), ETT Union (15 to 16,000), Multipurpose Health Workers (5,000), Contractual Employees (7-8,000).