Leaders of the Andhra Pradesh Teachers’ Federation (APTF) have expressed reservations over what they call “undemocratic and deceptive” stand of the A.P. Employees Joint Action Committee (JAC) leaders on the PRC issue.
Federation’s president K. Bhanu Murthy and general secretary P. Panduranga Varaprasad announced that they were resigning to the posts of the AP JAC’s co-chairman and executive committee member respectively, in protest. They said the leaders of the PRC Sadhana Samithi Steering Committee had diluted their stand in the initial stage itself.
The leaders had said they would accept the government invitation for talks only if it met their three prime demands – making public the Ashutosh Misra Committee report, repealing the G.O.s on the PRC issued on January 17, and paying salaries as per the old PRC from January this year. Later, they said they would come for talks if the invitation for the same was given in writing, said the federation leaders.
“Without addressing the main concerns, the government has declared the PRC as a closed chapter, and this is an insult to the JAC leadership,” the APTF leaders said.
They said the teachers’ federation was not in tandem with the steering committee leaders on certain issues, but it chose to overlook as it was a joint struggle.
The fact that the APTF had no representation in the steering committee of the PRC Sadhana Samithi despite being actively associated with the Employees’ JAC for last 10 years also did not go down well with the federation leaders.
They said the federation had worked really hard to mobilise scores of teachers and pensioners from across the State, which contributed to the success of the protest rally “that eventually softened the stand of the government.”
Instead of relying on this ‘power’ to achieve their demands, the leaders chose to make a climbdown, and the agitation ended without achieving the prime demands, they said.
The leaders said they chose to resign from the JAC since they did not see any purpose in continuing in the posts.
Fitment issue
Leaders of the AP United Teachers’ Federation (UTF) also criticised the government for not addressing the fitment issue.
PRC Steering Committee members Ch. Josephe Sudheer Babu, G. Hrudaya Raju and K.S.S. Prasad said though the government had responded favourably to some of their demands, the prime ones, including the fitment allowance, had been left unresolved.
They said the Ministers had not only denied it when the issue was raised but also advised them not to broach it in front of the Chief Minister, which, they said, was “undemocratic.”
