Port Blair, July 02: Mr. Kuldeep Rai Sharma, Member of Parliament, A&N Islands has taken up the matter with the Lt. Governor, A&N Islands requesting therein to consider for continuation of services of existing Guest/Contract Faculty members of these islands in the Degree colleges and also to enhance their monthly remuneration as per the revised norms of UGC.
Mr. Sharma, MP in his letter has stated that the new academic session 2019-20 in all the Higher Education Institutions of these islands is commencing from 1st July, 2019 after summer vacation but it has been learned that the existing Guest/Contract Faculty members are yet to be re-engaged by the Administration.
The MP emphasised that though there are regular faculty members in these institutions, most of these institutions are managed by engaging Guest Faculty as per the norms of UGC way back from 2002-2003 when the monthly remuneration paid to them was only Rs.5000/- which over the period has been increase to Rs.25,000/- per month till last academic session. Around 202 Guest Faculty members and 16 Contracts Faculty are regularly being engaged by the Higher Education institutions in these islands. The strength of temporary Faculty members indicates their important in imparting higher education in the colleges of these islands.
The Member of Parliament further stated that all these Guest Faculty members are engaged locally from among the islanders and they have been producing good results all these years and working to the utmost satisfaction of the institutions in which they are engaged. Most of these Guest /Contract faculty have also enhanced their qualification by way of qualifying NET or acquiring Ph.D to become regular Faculty members whenever their posts are advertised. However, few Guest/Contract Faculty members who are yet to acquire NET/Ph.D were also given continuous extension by virtue of their long service and good performance despite introduction of enhanced additional qualification of NET/ Ph.D.
It is learnt that till now the A&N Administration has not granted permission to extend the contract appointment of these Guest /Contract Faculty members for the new academic year 2019-2020 and the A&N Administration is planning to engage Guest/Contract Faculty members from mainland by advertising the vacancies in the mainland news papers on the plea that the presently locally engaged Guest/Contract Faculty members do not possess the required qualification.
In this regard, Mr. Sharma, Member of Parliament stated that the engagement of Guest/Contract Faculties from mainland will render the existing 218 Guest/Contract Faculty hailing from these islands jobless who are continuously serving these higher educational institutions for over 15 years. In fact, many of these Guest/Contract Faculty members are the only bread earners of their family, if these Guest/Contract faculties’ members are not considered for their continuous engagement; this will also further escalate the unemployment presently prevailing in these islands.
Taking into the account of all these aspects to protect the interest of the educated unemployed youth of these islands, Mr. Sharma, MP has requested the Lt. Governor to consider for continuation of services of existing Guest/Contract Faculty members of these islands in the Degree colleges and also to enhance their monthly remuneration as per the revised norms of UGC irrespective of having or not having the NET or Ph.D as was done in all the previous years.