Terminated ad-hoc teachers detained for protesting in Agartala

Agartala: The Tripura police on Friday arrested a section of the terminated teachers who were staging protest in front of Gandhi statue in Circuit house area under West Tripura district to demand their immediate recruitment.

Speaking with reporters, Bhaskar Deb, one of the agitating teachers and secretary of ‘Amra 10323′, said that the police forcibly took them into custody while they were protesting peacefully maintaining social distancing protocols.

“We were protesting peacefully in front of Gandhi statue maintaining social distancing but the police and TSR forcibly arrested us and took us into custody, the agitating teacher said.

The then Tripura government, led by chief minister Manik Sarkar, had recruited a total of 10,323 school teachers including graduate teachers, post graduate teachers and under graduate teachers and they were inducted in different phases starting 2010.

In 2014, the High Court of Tripura ordered to terminate all these teachers and termed this recruitment process as unconstitutional. Later in reference to an SLP filed by the state government, the Supreme Court upheld the High Court verdict in March 2017.

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The teachers were supposed to take retirement after December 31, 2017, but on hearing a special plea from the state government, the apex court kept them on ad-hoc basis for another two years. After change of government in November last year, the Supreme Court granted them a one-time final extension until March, 2020.

Now, among these 10,323 teachers only 8,882 ad-hoc teachers are left, including 4,375 under graduate teachers, 3,761 graduate teachers and 746 post graduate teachers.

Meanwhile, following the protest on Friday, traffic on the Agartala-Airport road was disrupted for some time.

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Speaking with EastMojo, Additional Inspector General (Law and order), Subrata Chakraborty said that a section of teachers were detained by the Tripura police in the afternoon for protesting on VIP road.

“Around 14-15 teachers who were protesting with placards in front of Gandhi Statue were detained by the by police under Section 151. However, in the evening, they were released with the permission from the judicial magistrate,” Chakraborty said.

Earlier, law minister Ratan Lal Nath said that the state cabinet in its meeting decided to set up a inquiry commission to find out the irregularities and illegalities committed in connection with the appointment of 10,323 teachers appointed during the year 2010 and 2013-14 fiscal years.

“The inquiry commission has been set up comprising a retired district judge and former Law secretary Goutam Debnath to make an inquiry relating to the irregularities and illegalities committed in connection with appointment of 10,323 teachers during the year 2010 and 2013-14 in Tripura,” Nath said.

On April 1, soon after the teachers were terminated on March 31 last, the state cabinet had announced provide Rs 35,000 as one time financial aid for those 8,882 teachers. A total of Rs 31.8 lakh was spent by the state government.

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