SIRAHA, FEBRUARY 24

Students of Janata Secondary School in Laxmipurpatari Rural Municipality, Siraha, today padlocked the school and ward office demanding that the salary of teachers be released immediately.

Four teachers, who have been paid their salary through the school's private resources, are on pen-down strike saying that they have not received their salary for the last one year. Students of the school have also supported the teachers and joined the protest. The students said they had padlocked the school as the teachers were demotivated and showed very less interested in teaching-learning activities as they were not paid salary for a long time.

Ansu Yadav, a tenth grader said that teaching-learning activities could not be conducted effectively even though the school had resumed classes after the lockdown.

Yadav said the daily activities in the school were halted as teachers were mostly involved in disputes and meetings related to salary.

The students warned the authority concerned that they would padlock the rural municipality office if teachers' salary was not released soon. Teaching-learning activities has been halted for the last three days.

The teachers said they could not teach students effectively due to lack of motivation. Umesh Kumar Chaudhary, a teacher, said he could not carry out the assigned duties as he did not have the motivation.

Chaudhary said that he worked very hard till late hours, but had no money even to recharge his mobile phone.

Another teacher, Shiva Narayan Yadav, said that it was very difficult to run the family as the school had deprived them of salary for a year.

Meanwhile, school head teacher, Arun Kumar Yadav, said the rural municipality had paid no attention to releasing the salary of teachers despite frequent requests. 'We have requested in written, but the authority concerned paid no attention,' he said. He added that they were compelled to halt daily activities due to this reason. Ward chairman Mahendra Sah said that he had been coordinating with the rural municipality to release the salary of teachers.

'The teachers will receive salary soon,' he said.

Rural municipality Chief Administrative Officer Sumitra Lama said the rural municipality was planning to release the salary soon. She said the salary would be released even through alternative resources.

A version of this article appears in the print on February 25, 2021, of The Himalayan Times.