Prematurely retired teachers threaten to self-immolate

PANJIM: The prematurely retired teachers have threatened to self-immolate themselves outside the chief minister’s office and the Directorate of Education if the government fails to resolve their long-pending grievance to stop forcibly retiring teachers at 58 years when the age was earlier fixed at 60 years.

The Discriminated Teachers’ Forum has served a fresh notice to Chief Minister Laxmikant Parsekar warning of taking the extreme step, and sought Governor Mridula Sinha’s intervention. “The forcible retirement has resulted in losing two years of our service which means we further lose two increments besides huge losses in our pension benefits,” the memorandum said. The premature retirement also discarded them from benefits like higher pension under VI pay commission. 
DTF President Neves Anthony Rebello pointed out glaring anomalies in the government order. He reminded Parsekar that the benefits under this order vastly differ from what was assured by former CM Manohar Parrikar.
“When Parrikar was the CM, he had publicly declared on the floor of the House in February/March 2013 that the government has accepted all our demands and made a budgetary provision of Rs 17 crore for prematurely retired teachers. But where is the money now,” he questioned, with a copy of the memorandum forwarded to the Governor seeking intervention. 

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