Meghalaya: SSA teachers meet education commissioner in state

A correspondent

Shillong: The All Meghalaya Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan School Teachers’ Association (AMSSASTA), earlier this week, met the Vijay Mantri Commissioner and Secretary, Education Department, to follow up on the demands of the association.

Peter Thyrniang, president of the association, said that during the discussion, Mantri informed the delegation of SSA teachers that, due to the absence of Chief Minister Conrad Sangma, in-charge Finance Department, the Education Department has not been able to take any decision on hiking their salaries. The Commissioner and Secretary of the Education Department urged the delegation to allow more time to address the issue.

According to Mantri, in the coming week he will be going to New Delhi to take up matters relating to the Education Department.

Meanwhile, the leaders of the AMSSASTA also informed him that during the discussion with the Commissioner and Secretary Education Department, the association urged him to consider lowering the pass marks for passing the Meghalaya Teachers’ Eligibility Test (MTET).

The association said that as of now the pass mark for clearing the MTET is 60 percent, even as it stated that Mantri assured the delegation that he would look into ways and means to lower it to 45 percent.

“This will in a way help the SSA teachers to become qualified teachers so that we can be at par with other categories of teachers and can be useful for us teachers to apply for teaching jobs of the government,” they stated.

It may be mentioned that the AMSSASTA were on a 21-day sit-in demonstration at Malki Ground since October 1, demanding that the salaries be hiked by 100 percent, which was called off on October 21. Then the AMSSASTA delegation had met Cabinet Minister and government spokesperson, Ampareen Lyngdoh, who told them that their demands would be met, but since there is a model code of conduct due to the Gambegre by-election, the state will not be able to make any announcement presently. The Gambegre by-election is slated for November 13.

According to the association, their last pay hike was in the year 2016. There are around 13,000 SSA teachers in the state. The AMSSASTA said that the current salary ranges from Rs 9,200 to Rs 19,044 for lower primary SAA school teachers and Rs 9,900 to Rs 20,493 for upper primary SSA school teachers. Officials in the Education Department said that the state government would require an additional amount of over Rs 300 crore for enhancing the salary of 13,000 SSA school teachers in the state.

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