Motihari (Bihar): "Happiness is no longer part of my life," said Kumari Neha. The 30-year-old was tragically widowed when her husband Deepak Anand, a government school teacher succumbed to Covid-19 while being treated at Government Medical College and Hospital at Bettiah, the headquarters of Bihar's West Champaran district. It hasn't even been two years since they got married and he leaves behind a one-year-old child. He is among the 54 government teachers claimed by the virus in East and West Champaran districts since the start of the second wave in April.
The state education department has initiated an exercise to determine the state-wide toll. "The compilation of data from other districts is being done. It is still at an introductory level," said a senior government functionary, refusing to be identified.
"In April and May 2021 alone, 29 of our teachers died," informed Awdesh Kumar Singh, District Education Officer (DEO) of East Champaran. West Champaran has witnessed 25 deaths, according to DEO Binod Kumar Vimal.
The districts are now staring at a huge loss to their basic education workforce when schools eventually reopen. While online classes were happening in an erratic manner, teachers had been struggling with finances either due to delayed salaries or increasing expenditures. As a result, they were often unable to pay for the treatments.
Bihar Panchayat Nagar Prarambhik Shikshak Sangh (BPNPSS), a teacher's association in East Champaran, believes that timely salaries could have prevented some deaths. The delay in salaries is typical and a delay of two months is quite common for both regular and contractual teachers.
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The association's president, Amardeep Kumar said, "Most of them are contractual teachers who died owing to a financial crunch. They were deprived of their salaries for four months, and hence they did not opt for the best medical services. As per the allotment received, the salary was paid for November, December (2020) and January (2021) -- about 80 per cent of salary was received for the latter. Teachers were without payments between February and May 2021."
Praful Kumar Mishra, District Programme Officer (Establishment) of the education department in East Champaran, confirmed the delay in salaries. "We process the payment as soon as the allotment arrives. The pending salaries have been paid towards the end of May," he said.
Teachers have confirmed that they have now received their salaries but for many families, it is too late. "Due to lack of money, my husband ignored going to the doctor and preferred to take medicines prescribed by the chemist," said Savita Kumari, 42, about Ramesh Sah, a government teacher in West Champaran. "But his health deteriorated suddenly and he had to be admitted to GMCH on May 1. He passed away the following day before he could even be tested," she says.