PTA sweeps Punjabi University Teachers’ Association polls

Patiala, October 21

The Progressive Teachers’ Alliance (PTA) grabbed all four office-bearer posts of Punjabi University Teachers’ Association (PUTA), the polling for which was conducted on Friday.

The PTA grabbed the posts of president, vice-president, secretary and joint secretary-cum-treasurer after 495 out of total 527 votes were polled during the day.

Nishan Singh Deol of the Department of Physical Education grabbed 274 votes to become the president of the PUTA as his opponent Avneet Pal Singh received 211 votes. Mohan Singh, assistant professor at the Department of Punjabi Literary Studies secured 260 votes and became the vice-president. He defeated Sukhwinder Singh of Women Study Centre who got only 223 votes. Maninder Singh, assistant professor at the Department of Computer Science got 292 votes and defeated Gurjit Singh Bhathal by a margin of 97 votes to become the PUTA secretary. Bhathal got only 195 votes. Er Karandeep Singh who contested for the post of joint secretary cum treasurer got 258 votes. He defeated his opponent Arneet Grewal by a margin of 30 votes.

Nishan Singh had remained on the post of PUTA president in 2020 as well. He said they have managed to be victorious because of teachers’ unity.

Maninder Singh said he would work on pending promotions of teachers under the Career Advancement Scheme. “The VC had wrongly rejected eight teachers for promotion. We will work to get the rejection removed. There are many other pending demands, including, implementation of headship of assistant professors by rotation, implementation of the 7th pay commission scales etc.”

The result of executive member posts was yet to be declared at the time of filing this copy.