The plight of non-government teachers has been an old issue even though with the passage of time the situation looks much better than the previous times. The teachers who started their job with monthly salary taka five only in Pakistan period now enjoy the benefits from the royal treasury. Still the serious discrimination between the government and non-government teachers reminds us how negligence this sector is! Our education management basically started from the British period and since then we could not advance very far. Since the British period, the people in the administration used to encourage education to remain in the private sector and no financial benefit to be borne by the state. Teachers’ small salary and benefits and other expenditure must be borne by individual educational institutions. That was the principle and rules of modern education system. It’s true that we have crossed British period, experienced Pakistan rule and now have observed 53rd anniversary of our independence but the situation of education, the non-government educational institutions and particularly teachers’ overall status has not improved significantly. 

If we cast our glance back we see in 1957 during the tenure of President Iskander Mirza around 20 thousand teachers of 1600 secondary schools went on a strike to realize some of their demands. One important demand among others was to increase the amount of allowance from Tk 5 to Tk 20 that met no results. Teachers had to go back to their respective schools from the field of agitation where ‘Realize our demands, you must realize our demands’’ was the slogan uttered by the teachers. Teachers came down to street again in 1958 and this time around eleven hundred college teachers from 64 colleges also joined with the twenty thousand school teachers. Due to continuous strike educational activities came to a standstill. That could draw a little attention of the government and their allowance was doubled which was followed by triple amount, i.e. school teachers received Tk fifteen and for college teachers it was made Tk 20 per month. When Ayub Khan came to power college teachers used to get Tk 30 and school teacher taka 20 per month from the state treasury as grant. They used to get it after three months that came in the name of the institution. Though it was distributed every three months, it took four or five months for the teachers to receive it. This example is enough how much teachers were neglected since that time. Teachers again started demonstration in 1958 across the province and this time the college teachers wanted Tk 50 and school teachers Tk 30 as their allowance. By this time, Martial Law was imposed in entire Pakistan by Ayub Khan. During Martial Law all sorts of demonstrations remained suspended.

In 1980 the state facilities for the non-government teachers saw further change and some want to term it as a revolutionary change that took place in the life the non-government teachers. It was for the first time in the history of this country when school, college and madrasa teachers were included in the national pay scale and the state took the responsibility to offer fifty percent of it from the treasury. According to this decision a principal of a non-government college used to get Tk 1050 from the treasury as his/her 2100 taka salary ( 1977 declared) , vice principal 925 taka which is half of his/her scale 1850, assistant professor taka 700 that means half of the salary 1400 and lecturer 375 taka meaning half of his scale Tk 750. Accordingly, secondary and madaras teachers also started getting their salary in the same manner; I mean fifty percent of their basic salary as per the national pay scale.

And today’s situation looks quite good though many things still need to be done if we really want to develop a smart education system. Now the fourth grade principal of a non-government college draws salary of taka 50,500, vice principal in the fifth grade with 43000, assistant professor in the sixth grade 35500 taka salary and lectures in the ninth grade 22000 per month , though they don’t get all the benefits that government teachers enjoy. Though the amount of house rent, medical allowance and festival bonus is not like government teachers, they get something which talks about the changed picture comparing to the remote past.

No government actually listened to the demands and pains of the non-government teachers, which means that the significant contribution of teachers in building a nation has remained neglected. All the government departments, vital or ordinary, enjoy full state facilities. Only the teachers who really build the base of a nation and create future leaders have continued witnessing the negligence from the state. The non-government teachers still demonstrate on the street for increasing their festival allowance from 25 percent to hundred percent. Still they demonstrate to be nationalized. If nationalization proves difficult or strategically not fruitful, we must have option that the non-government teachers will have financial security so that they can dedicate themselves to their noble profession without diverting their attention from the classroom teaching.

The writer is the President of English Teachers’ Association of Bangladesh (ETAB). Email: [email protected]