KHYBER: Nine female teachers of the recently established Government Girls Degree College in Bara are awaiting payment of their salaries for the last 10 months.
The aggrieved staff told Dawn during a visit to the college in Alamgudar area in Bara that they were faced with serious financial issues as they had now started borrowing money for their personal expenses from their relatives and friends.
All the nine female subject specialists, having the required educational qualification in their respective subjects, were hired on a contract basis over a year ago when the college started functioning, with assurances from officials from the provincial education department that their services would soon be regularised.
“We are now running from pillar to post for several months while pleading with the concerned officials for the release of our suspended salaries,” a visibly perturbed chemistry lecturer Ms Asmat Ara told Dawn.
Hailing from Swabi district, she said that she had rented a room in a private hostel in Peshawar along with bearing other necessary expenses while anxiously awaiting her salary for the last 10 months.
She said that her father was now retired from his government service while three of her brothers were still jobless and three other unmarried sisters, she wanted to support her impoverished family prior to joining her new assignment at the Bara Degree College for Girls.
Ms Ufaq Ishaq, a mathematics teacher, was equally affected by the prolonged delay in payment of her salary and said that now she was relied highly on her father, who is also a teacher.
She said that she along with other affected female staff members were continuing with their ‘duties’ under compulsion as they were not in a position to quit their current jobs due to nonpayment of salaries as they would be rendered jobless forever due to a saturating situation in government departments.
“I face difficulties now in payment of my transport fare as I have to hire a private vehicle to come to the college on a daily basis with very little money in my purse”, she added.
The aggrieved female staffers of the Government Girls Degree College in Bara made a passionate appeal to the chief minister, minister for education and the concerned secretaries of education and finance to immediately release their ‘stuck’ salaries and provide them with much-needed financial relief.
Published in Dawn, November 1st, 2024
