'Tedious' PFMS system irks teachers

Aparna Banerji

Jalandhar, March 28

With two days to go for the deadline, the hurried shifting of all financial payments and transactions of government schools to the central government’s Public Financial Management System (PFMS) has drawn condemnation from government schoolteachers. Teachers have termed it a long, complicated and tedious process which will require them to fill in multiple vendor details on the PFMS website manually and then obtain PPAs (Print Payment Advice) for each one of them from the bank. Additionally, as per the new instructions, if teachers don’t exhaust the available funds provided for the month as per the PFMS system until March 31, then the amount will lapse.

Schools were earlier receiving funds directly into their designated bank accounts. As per the PFMS system, they will now have to upload the details of all vendors, grocers and beneficiaries associated with the mid day meal, stipend, scholarship and other schemes directly onto the website. The money will be sent directly into their accounts of beneficiaries through the website.

‘Complicated process’

As per the new system, a school’s every single vendor’s bank account details, Aadhaar number, address, contact number, GST number (if commercial firm) and DOB will have to be uploaded. After submitting details of a scheme/grant (e.g mid-day meal) through an operator ID, approval will be obtained from a second approver ID. Then a print payment advice (PPA) is to be obtained. A hard copy of the PPA (signed by a government School Management Committee’s Chairman and Secretary) will then be deposited in the bank. Same process is to be repeated for all 8 to 10 grants/funds at every single school.

While first intimations of the PFMS were made 2 months ago, instructional videos of the process were being sent to teachers’ phones about 15 day ago as well. Teachers termed the complicated process amidst ongoing exams left too little time to register. In remote areas with poor connectivity teachers scurry in cyber cafes. The PFMS website has crashed today due to excessive traffic.

Teachers confused

A teacher at a primary school said, “We are already working on results, ongoing Class V exams, postal issues, activities other than teaching. With the last date approaching, most won’t be able to submit details. Every school has seven to nine grants and at times deal with 8 to 20 vendors. I had submitted my school’s PPA to a bank and they have called back it isn’t proper. But I filled it accurately. Teachers are supposed to only teach. This will pile unnecessary workload on them.”

Karnail Phillaur, district president, Government Teachers Union, said, “A new system is imposed upon teachers already burdened with clerical work. The website is out of order today and most teachers can’t fill in details until March 31. Given their workload, a simple and easy process should have been introduced. We have been smoothly functioning with the existing system for years. The ease of transactions and the comfort of teachers will be severely affected.”

Gurbhajan Singh, DEO (Elementary), Jalandhar, said, “The money will now go directly into beneficiaries’ accounts so it will be a foolproof system. It will also make it easier to monitor fund usage. Some teachers have been facing initial hiccups due to the digital process but we are hopeful the work will be done before the deadline.”