Cuttack: The Odisha Secondary School Teachers’ Association (OSSTA) Wednesday claimed that as many as 2,500 posts of high school headmasters are lying vacant in the state.
The teachers’ body claimed that the state government had directed the School and Mass Education (S&ME) department to fill the vacant posts of headmasters through promotion. However, the S&ME department is dilly-dallying the process, OSSTA alleged.
OSSTA office-bearers claimed that the headmaster posts in at least 2,500 high schools out of the 3,600 government high schools in the state have been lying vacant for years. As per the state government guidelines, the S&ME department was supposed to fill the posts through the promotion of junior teachers. However, not a single junior teacher has been promoted since 2015, they alleged.
In the meantime, the Chief Minister had issued a directive January 1 this year and directed the authorities concerned to promote the eligible employees of various departments through the Promotion Adalat by December-end every year. Any violation of the directive would invite punitive action against the officials concerned, the directive said. However, the directive remained on paper only, they alleged.
OSSTA sources claimed that there is a provision for formation of a state-level cadre of assistant teachers for promotion of eligible teachers. However, the cadre formed by the S&ME department has several anomalies. Challenging the formation of the cadre, several petitions have been filed in the Orissa High Court, they said.
“The S&ME department always claims that it has failed to fill the vacant posts of high school headmasters due to legal hurdles. However, the Advocate General informed the HC that as many as 2,547 high school headmaster posts have been lying vacant in the state. The Advocate General told the court March 4 that the education system in state has collapsed due to the large-scale vacancies. Soon, the HC withdrew its interim stay on the issue and directed the state government to fill the vacant posts of headmasters at the earliest,” said an office-bearer of OSSTA.
However, the state government is yet to implement the HC order on the issue, OSSTA alleged.
“We urge the Chief Minister to intervene in the issue and take appropriate steps to fill the vacant posts of headmasters,” said OSSTA secretary Prakash Chandra Mohanty at a press conference here Wednesday.
Among others, OSSTA president Binod Bihari Panigrahi, executive presidents Bhikari Charan Sahu and Ranjan Kumar Dash and treasurer Ashok Kumar Mahapatra were present.
