Work Education Instructors of Haryana sit on fast unto death

Demokratic Front, Chandigarh, 03 August :

The Work Education Instructors, employed under the Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan in various government schools of Haryana, have sat on fast unto death at the protest site behind Shiksha Sadan, Sector-5, Panchkula, in connection with their demand of By-Laws 2013 and Grade-Pay.

All the directly recruited employees under Samagra Shiksha, apart from Work Education Instructors, have benefits of Bye Laws 2013 and Grade Pay recommended by the Council. Even, though the salary of vocational teachers recruited through various companies has also been increased to Rs. 32,000, the wage of Work Education Instructors (Rs. 10,000 in 2014), got a negligible raise of Rs 5000 in the last 9 years.  

However, they are always given additional work during the 15th of August, 26th January, Kala Utsav, Talent Search, Gita Jayanti, BLO, Election Duty, Rang Manch program, Bal Utsav, State/ National level camps, Cultural programs, State level program of NSS, etc. Even during the Covid period, they were given additional duties. Many times they are asked to go to other districts for duty, for which they do not get any allowance.

Rajat Bhatt, President of the Sangharsh Samiti, said that continuous stepmotherly treatment by the department has caused anger among these employees. We met the concerned officials several times regarding the demands but to no avail. Intensifying the movement, four work education instructors, namely Sandeep Kumar (Jind), Deep Kumar (Panipat), Sangeeta Devi (Hisar), and Jaswinder Singh (Yamunanagar) have sat on fast unto death.