Nagaland Hindi teachers say they are qualified; request government to release salary

Dimapur, Feb. 19 (EMN): The All Nagaland Hindi Teachers’ Union (ANHTU) on Saturday clarified that a total of 1379 Hindi teachers were recruited under the centrally-sponsored scheme (CSS) after taking written and oral examinations in 2012, 2013 and 2014, fulfilling all the criteria, and hence qualified.

The statement came a day after the advisor of School Education, K Tokugha Sukhalu, said at an event that the government of India had refused to release funds for Hindi teachers in the state as many of them don’t meet the required eligibility.

Sukhalu had said that as per the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE) norm, only class 12th pass with a Hindi diploma are eligible for undergraduate Hindi teacher’s post but most teachers in the state are 10th pass, so the government of India had refused to pay the salaries’.

However, the ANHTU contended that Nagaland state had not adopted the NCTE norms at the time of appointing the 1379 CSS Hindi teachers but did so in 2017, after which the state government gave a five-year relaxation period (2022-2027), through an order, for the untrained Hindi teachers to undergo training and fulfill the NCTE criteria.

‘At present, the state has only one training centre for Hindi; the Education department, government of Nagaland, has sought permission for tie up with IGNOU to provide training facilities for which the permission process to the NCTE has undergone and the results will be announced soon,’ read the statement from ANHTU.

‘Also, many untrained Hindi teachers have been trained in 10 years, fulfilling the NCTE criteria. However, many Hindi teachers are deprived of their regular allotted salary which has been a huge grievance,’ it added.

The union, therefore, appealed to the state government to look into the matter, treat every state employee using the same yardstick and release “regular salary” at the earliest.

It may be mentioned that the advisor of School Education had highlighted the issue faced by the government, days after the ANHTU, Mon Unit expressed dismay over non-payment of salaries for three months. The Kohima and Peren units of the union have also requested the Education department and the state government to release their pending salaries along with arrears without further delay and ensure timely disbursement of salary in future.