December begins, Punjab teachers get half of August salary, no word on arrears

“After a wait for their pending salaries since August, we got 15-day salary for August a few days back. There is no information when the remaining amount would be released,” said a government school teacher.

There are 14,090 SSA/RMSA teachers’ posts, of which around 4,000 are lying vacant.

“Usually, our salaries are delayed by 3-4 months, but whenever government releases the pending salary for a month or two, it is always full salary for that month/months. This is the first time that we have got only a half-month salary,” said Gurpreet Singh, president of SSA/RMSA Teachers Union.

Already, some teachers have left their jobs because of chronic delay in salaries as well as non- regularisation of their service even after spending nine years in the job while government’s own rule says teachers would be eligible for regularisation after three years of contractual service, said Singh.

Another leader of the union, Hardeep Singh, said the Centre and state governments contributed 65:35 respectively towards their salaries. “We have got information that the Centre had paid its share, but the state government was not releasing it for teachers,” he said.

“All our festivals came and went without our salaries being paid. Now, the government has started this new trend of paying a month’s salary in parts instead in one go,” said Tilak Raj, a teacher under SSA. Punjab DGSE Parshant Goyal did not answer calls.