Protesting teachers defer Parliament March after assurance from Education Ministry

“Today's Parliament March by teachers from all over India has been postponed after Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan called a meeting with our representatives in which Deputy Secretary Rahul Pachori assured to remove NC tag in 3 months. If not, teachers will polish shoes at New Delhi Railway Station as a protest on 5th September 2022 Teacher’s Day,” said Debashish Hota, President of the DELED Teacher’s association.

New Delhi: Hundreds of teachers camping in the national capital to protest against the Union Education Ministry, postponed their Parliament March today after meeting with the Deputy Secretary of the Education Ministry who assured them to resolve their issue within 3 months of time. These are the teachers who completed a two-year DELED course launched by the National Institute of Open Schooling (NIOS) which comes under the Ministry of Education. The number of DELED teachers in country is said to be around 1.8 Lakh who have been demanding the removal of NC tags (Not Confirmed) attached with them.

“Today's Parliament March by teachers from all over India has been postponed after Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan called a meeting with our representatives in which Deputy Secretary Rahul Pachori assured to remove NC tag in 3 months. We hope the tag will be removed immediately as assured. If not, teachers will polish shoes at New Delhi Railway Station as a protest on 5th September 2022 Teacher’s Day,” said Debashish Hota, President of the DELED Teacher’s association.

This was the fourth time that these teachers from different states organized a sit-in protest in the national capital. They claim that a senior official from the Ministry of Education assured them last time that the 'Not Confirmed' tags will be removed soon but nothing happened after that. Irked by the government’s apathy, the teachers lodged a protest at District Collector’s offices in their respective states in November 2021 and then organized a 5-day long sit-in protest at Jantar Mantar in Delhi in the same month.

“Even on 21st February 2022, hundreds of victimized teachers were ready for Parliament march from Boat Club Police post. Then also the Education Minister intervened and organized a meeting of his senior PPS Satyabrata Padhi with a National Level Delegation led by me. Padhi had then assured to solve the issue just after completion of UP Elections but nothing happened,“ said Debashish Hota.

The protesting teachers completed a 2-year DELED Course at NIOS, an agency of Central Education Ministry in 2019. The trainees paid Rs 1 lakh as a course fee and passed the examinations but no certificates were issued to them after the completion of course. This is the reason why these teachers fell into the NC category. Many of them are not being paid for their jobs and now they say that they might even lose their jobs as well.

Debashisha further informed that the Bihar government has already stopped the salary of 17,000 teachers three years back citing NC tag reason. “We approached NIOS but they skirted the issue and put the onus on NCTE, another agency of Central Education Ministry. NCTE passes the buck to Central Education Ministry and unfortunately Ministry blamed the RTE-2009 Act for their pending issue. However there is no provision for NC Tag in RTE-2009 Act then why these 1.8 lakh teachers from all over India are suffering for the last 3 years for their no-fault?” he added.