DOOMDOOMA, April 30 - Around 30,000 teachers working in 6,000 venture educational institutions across the state are facing severe economic hardship during the ongoing lockdown period. Thousands among them are doing some petty trade with their families and children for a meal.
Talking to this correspondent, Pradip Kumar Moran, president of the Assam Apradeshikrita Shikshanushtan Suraksha Mancha, said, �Thousands of teachers are selling vegetables with their families to manage a meal. One of my colleagues, who has been teaching in a venture school for the last 20 years, is doing bamboo craft work to survive.�
Moran said that the suffering of the teachers of venture educational institutions has been going unnoticed for the last 30 years. On the other hand, teachers working in private schools have also been suffering from hardship during the lockdown.
�Private schools owners say that teachers� salaries are paid from the funds which are collected as monthly tuition fee from the students. As the fee collection has been stopped, the schools are unable to pay the teachers. Private tuition has already been stopped. The teachers get very small amount of salary, so there is no question of saving. Now the teachers are hopefully looking to the government to provide them some financial assistance in this period of crisis. The education department should ensure that teachers should be paid through their bank accounts and submit the list to district administration,� said a senior teacher of a private school here.
�NGOs should come forward to help these teachers. The NGOs and samaritans should help them reaching their doorsteps,� said another teacher of a venture school.
�It was almost the beginning of the session and the schools were shut down suddenly. We too are in financial crisis. Yet, the school management is trying its best to provide salary to its all teaching and non-teaching staff,� said the owner of a private school here.
It can be mentioned here that the state government on March 15 ordered shutting down of educational institutions as a preventive measure to stop the spread of COVID-19.
Thefts on the rise: Sporadic incidents of theft in Doomdooma circle are on the rise in the last couple of weeks, with the miscreants taking advantage of the lockdown.
In such an incident, burglars broke open RK Medical, a medicine wholesale store in the town and stole a monitor of a computer set on Tuesday. Another nearby outlet was completely looted.
