Punjab Cabinet Okays Rationalisation Policy, Teachers to be Posted Across Different Category Schools

Chandigarh: To overcome the shortage of teachers in senior secondary schools, the Punjab government has approved a new rationalisation policy to appoint teachers in schools facing staff crunch. The decision was taken at a Cabinet meet headed by chief minister, Captain Amarinder Singh.

The government said that the new policy will removes the distinction between various categories of schools and teachers will be posted irrespective of the nature of schools. By removing the category distinction, teachers can now be posted anywhere between SSA, RMSA, Model and Adarsh schools. Officials said services of 1,500 surplus teachers will become available with this.

As per this policy, the post of a head teacher would only be created in primary schools if the number of students is more than 60 to help increase student strength in schools. The teacher student ratio at present is 27 in primary schools, 22 in middle schools, 16 in high schools and 29 for senior secondary schools.

Although the ratio is well within the norms, there is still a shortage of teachers at both inter district and intra-district levels.

The policy also makes it mandatory for school principals to take classes - 12 per week for principals and 15 for headmasters.

The spokesperson said the enrollment of students as on April 30, 2018 would be taken as the base to implement the new policy. In case of staff surplus in the school, the teachers with the longest stay would be shifted out to a common pool and all the vacancies would be put on the government website.

A list of the surplus teachers in a particular subject based on seniority will be prepared and they would be given the chance to opt for a school. Teachers suffering from life threatening disease would not be shifted out. The policy also highlighted that many teachers preferred to get posted in middle schools, since there are no Board exams.

As per the norms, there are seven sanctioned posts in the middle schools with average strength of 22 students, which leads to a high level of under-utilisation of teachers, whereas, at the same time, there is shortage of teachers in the high schools and senior secondary schools.

The requirement of teachers, as per the norms of Government of India, in middle schools is three (single section). The policy provides for four posts of teachers with English/SST, Maths/Science, Punjabi and Hindi as subjects in place of the present seven. One post and one section would be increased accordingly, in case the number of sections in a school increases, which would help the department save 8,007 posts, having annual financial implication of Rs 576 crore.