Mangalore : The Karnataka State High School Assistant Masters’ Association staged protest in front of DC Office on Feb 19, Saturday demanding an increase in pay scale from the current Rs. 8,825 – Rs. 16,000 to Rs. 10,800 – Rs. 20,025.
Addressing the protestors, Manjunath Kumar K. K., the organizing secretary of the association said that besides these the association wants the state government to set pay scale anomalies as per the recommendations of the Education Department Commissioner, based on the V Pay Commission.
He said that, the government has been consistently ignoring the appeals of the association to do justice to the assistant masters.
Mr. Manjunath also pointed out the fact that the pay scale of assistant masters in Karnataka is much lower than the pay scale in other states.
The association also wants the government to honor the order of the Karnataka Administrative Tribunal and promote 75 percent of high school teachers as headmasters and 50 percent of headmasters as college lecturers. The other demands of the association include medical allowance, special increment for teachers who have passed Kannada examinations, time-bound recurring promotions, and removal of discrepancies in pay scales of junior and senior teachers.
The association also demands that suspended period of SSLC evaluators should be considered as special leave and that economic measures imposed on aided high schools should be withdrawn. The association demanded that teachers recruited on the basis of rural grace marks in 1998 – 99 should be given back their jobs and various facilities due to them and that their seniority should be taken into consideration. It also stressed the need for recruitment of Hindi inspectors.
Prior to the protest, the rally was commenced from Jyothi Circle. Later, the association will submit a memorandum to the state government through DC Subodh Yadav
Ramakrishna Shirur, the district unit president of the association, teasurer Vasanth, general secretary Gopalkrishna, BK Bhat, Abraham, Ramanand, Krishna Achar and many others were present.