Tripura teachers reject govt offer, continue indefinite stir

Agartala, Dec 9 : The indefinite sit-in by thousands of Tripura government school teachers, who had lost their jobs following court verdicts, continued for the third day on Wednesday even as they rejected Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb’s offer to apply for the vacant posts.
The leaders of the Joint Movement Committee (JMC), which is spear-heading the agitation, on Wednesday reiterated to intensify their stir until the state government gives them a written assurance about reinstating them.
Deb has asked the agitating teachers to compete for the vacant 9,000 posts in various departments including the Education Department for which the state government has recently issued notifications.
“Instead of doing agitations, these teachers must prepare themselves and apply for their jobs as the government already published the necessary notification to recruit people against 9,000 vacant government posts,” Deb told the media.
JMC’s Joint Convener Dalia Das, however, said that the teachers already completed several years of government service and several of them crossed their stipulated age and thus the Chief Minister’s offer is impractical.
“We had suspended our agitation after the Chief Minister on October 3 assured to take steps to solve our problems permanently within two months. The two months have already lapsed, but the Chief Minister and his government yet to take any step when the teachers are suffering a lot after losing their jobs in March this year,” Das said.