Dhangadi, January 6

Teachers’ organisations in Kailali have launched an agitation against the District Education Officer, accusing him of acting against past agreements and understandings.

As part of their agitation, the teachers organisations’ representatives padlocked the office of District Education Officer Ganesh Bahadur Singh today. “As he failed to rectify his actions even after frequent reminders to do the needful to improve the educational environment and not to curtail the rights of teachers’ associations, we had to resort to the agitation,” said Nepal Teachers’ Association Kailali Chairperson Bhupal Khadka.

According to Khadka, they will boycott all the programmes attended by the DEO as a show of protest.

Besides NTA, Nepal National Teachers’ Organisation, United All Nepal Teachers’ Organisation, All Nepal Teachers’ Organisation, All Nepal Teachers’ Association, Nepal National Teachers’ Council, Madhesi Teachers’ Forum Democratic, Madheshi Teachers’ Forum Nepal, Nepal Teachers’ Federation, Nepal Teachers’ Union, All Nepal Teachers’ Organisation and HISTAN have expressed solidarity with the agitation.

“Earlier, there was an agreement not to transfer teachers out of the district and to give the nod to the concerned school to fill the vacant posts till the end of the next fiscal, but he violated these agreements, hence the agitation,” Khadka argued.

Besides, allegations such as random issuance of permission letters to private schools, failure to ensure transparency in all the office procedures and throwing his weight behind each and every decision including the selection of head teachers and others at government schools, among others, are charges that have been pressed against him.

On his part, DEO Singh defended himself, saying he had not violated the rules while making any decision. “Whatever charges are levelled against me are just pure fibs as I’ve done everything in accordance with the rule,” Singh argued.