Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Apr 1: The Government has started a recruitment drive on the basis of war footing in School Education Department where about 15,877 posts of teaching staff are lying vacant at present.
This was stated by Deputy Chief Minister Tara Chand while replying to two separate calling attention notices of Prof Chaman Lal Gupta and Javed Ahmed Dar in State Assembly today.
In reply to Dar’s Calling Attention Motion the Deputy Chief Minister said 4,451 vacant posts of teachers which include 379 posts in district Baramulla have been referred to Service Selection Board for selection on fast track basis.
He said already 1500 teachers have been promoted to the level of Masters in Kashmir Division and their adjustment orders will be issued shortly. Besides 581 posts of lecturers have been referred to the Public Service Commission (PSC) for selection by way of direct recruitment of candidates, he added.
He said however, the department has promoted 1814 eligible Masters/ teachers as incharge lecturers and they will be adjusted shortly against the vacant posts of lecturers. Moreover, the vacant posts of principals / headmasters will be filled shortly by way of promotion of eligible senior lecturers and Masters, he added
Javed Dar said that education is not an ordinary department but one of the most important departments and it should be run with a missionary zeal.
Earlier the Government in a written reply in State Assembly recently had admitted that 15,877 posts of teaching staff including 121 principals and equivalent and 10 ZEPOs are vacant in the State.
This also includes 7972 teachers, 5093 Masters, 627 Headmasters and 3211 lecturers.
Tara Chand while replying to Calling Attention Motion of Prof Chaman Lal Gupta said that toilet facilities are available in all the schools of Jammu district which includes girls schools of Jammu West Constituency. Moreover, temporary arrangements have been made in 225 schools of Jammu district where the construction work of toilet units are in progress, he added.
He said there are 51 schools existing in Jammu West Constituency having toilet facility, however in mobile primary school Lakkar Mandi temporary arrangements of toilet facility has also been made. He refuted that the students were facing problems on account of the same.
Earlier, Prof Gupta said that the students were facing hardships due to lack of toilet facilities in the schools. He said the Government schools show zero percent results and this is the reason that children rush to private schools as the Government schools lack infrastructure.
In reply to a Calling Attention Motion of JSM MLA Ashwani Sharma, Minister of Law and Parliamentary Affairs Mir Saifullah said the people are using power without the agreement due to which the load has increased on the transformers. He urged the member to impress upon the people to sign agreements to avert the problems.
He said at various places in Bishnah Constituency the agreed load is less than what is the actual consumption.
The MLA however said that the border area and other rural people were facing many hardships as Government’s focus is urban areas always. He said that Receiving stations at Chak Hasal, Suhagpur and Bishnah in his Constituency be augmented as people are facing many hardships due to power crisis.
He said the load will increase day by day with the result problems will be compounded in coming Summer and people will have many complaints about power.
Participating in Zero Hour Ashwani Sharma said that Amnesty scheme be strengthened as poor people are unable to pay flat rate of power after the cut off date is over. He said entire House is concerned for the same. The consumers should be allowed to pay tariff in installments, he added.
He demanded that the power tariff of farmers be waived off and domestic surcharge should also be waived off. The farmers using pump sets for one or two months in a year have to pay hefty amount as power tariff. The Government on one hand talks of welfare of farmers and on the other hand nothing is being done for them, he added.