The sit-in camp of ad-hoc lecturers of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa outside Peshawar Press Club for regularisation of their services and release of salaries entered third day on Friday. Ad-hoc Lecturers’ Association President Afsar Khan and general secretary Safiullah are leading the protest camp.
The salaries of 213 male and female lecturers working on ad-hoc basis in different colleges of FATA have been stopped since September 2015.
The lecturers were appointed in 2011 by the provincial government on ad-hoc basis.
In his address on the occasion, Afsar Khan said, “We have been working in challenging areas like FATA on deputation without deputation allowances. Our lives are at risk in the hot-bed of terrorism, FATA. On the other hand our salaries are not released for the last eight months.”
Safiullah said that In 2014 KP government had regularised those lecturers who had been appointed in 2010. Whereas, as many as 213 lecturers both male and female appointed in 2011 are still awaiting regularisation.
On the floor of KP assembly, the Higher Education Minister Mushtaq Ahmed Ghani promised that an amendment bill would be introduced for the regularisation of the lecturers appointed in 2011, but he could not fulfill his promise.
KP Chief Minister Pervaiz Khattak in January 2016 promised regularisation of the ad-hoc lecturers in one week. On Khattak’s special directives the provincial higher education department constituted a committee regarding their regularisation. The committee prepared its summary and submitted it to the establishment department, but it still awaits approval.
Hazrat Wali, a lecturer, said, “Our salaries have not been released since September last year (2015). We are forced to boycott classes and stage protest on the road against the incompetency of the government. We demand immediate release of salaries and issuance of regularisation notification. The protest camp and boycott of classes will continue till the acceptance of our demands.”
