Ludhiana | SCD College’s guest faculty yet to receive six months’ salary

Most of the SCD college, Ludhiana, teachers have been forced to “borrow money from their colleagues or even from their students” to pay their monthly expenses due to their pending six months’ salary

Around 60 guest faculty members at SCD Government College have not received their salaries for the past six months, while this has not been the case with other government colleges in Ludhiana.

However, director public instructions, colleges, Punjab, Rajiv Kumar Gupta, however, said, “It’s been over a week since the salary bills of these teachers were cleared by me, and were forwarded to the treasury department of the state. They must be on it, and the six months’ salary is hopeful of being deposited in SCD College, Ludhiana, account at the earliest.” (HT FILE)

Most of these teachers have been forced to “borrow money from their colleagues or even from their students” to pay their monthly expenses.

According to the officials, the guest teachers are paid half by the college and the rest is paid by the state finance department. While the college had been paying these teachers regularly, they didn’t receive any money from the state government since January.

The situation is much grimmer for the married couples deputed at the said college as they are fully dependent on their salaries from college to finance their expenses.

“It has been a very disturbing time for my family. I have been asking for financial favours from my friends, colleagues and relatives. It was very sweet of the students, but embarrassing for me when they offered me money as financial help. It’s been six months now that I haven’t received a salary due to which I couldn’t pay my electricity bill in time and also paid penalty,” a guest faculty member said.

‘Seems something personal against us’

“Whenever we raise objections or ask for our salary, we are told that there has been some technical glitch since January. We were told initially that our salaries were transferred to wrong accounts, but the problem has still not been resolved. All other guest teachers in other colleges have been paid, but here the technical glitch has not been fixed even after six months. It seems something personal against us since we had been raising issues concerning the welfare of the teachers in the state,” another teacher said.

However, director public instructions, colleges, Punjab, Rajiv Kumar Gupta, however, said, “It’s been over a week since the salary bills of these teachers were cleared by me, and were forwarded to the treasury department of the state. They must be on it, and the salaries are hopeful of being deposited in the college account at the earliest.”

When asked why the salaries were not released, he claimed to be unaware of the situation before his joining, adding that the issue must be known to his predecessor.

Meanwhile, Ashwani Bhalla, ADPI, said the delay was not from their department but it was due to some technical glitch at the part of the treasury office.

“We are in touch with them and the treasury officers have assured us that the money will be transferred to the college’s account within two days,” Bhalla claimed