Telangana: Reprieve for aided school staff

Hyderabad: Government-aided school teachers may get a reprieve from paying back hikes earned 35 years ago to the government now.

The TS government is doing a rethink on recovering the money paid to these teachers through pay hikes before 1980.

About 990 teachers would have had to pay back around Rs 5 to Rs 6 lakh each to the government.

The government had been recovering money paid to aided school teachers via pay hikes sanctioned before 1980 following a HC order. Hikes given to aided school teachers were declared illegal by the HC.

In 2005, the united AP government also passed legislation making pay hikes offered to aided school teachers before 1980 illegal and subsequently ordered recovery of the money.

Many of these teachers are retired now, making it difficult for them to pay the government back. They wanted the government to waive the money.

TS education principal secretary Ranjeev Acharya held a meeting with school education department officials on Tuesday to discuss this issue.

Sources said the government is now having a rethink and has asked lower level officials to send reports of the total number of such teachers, estimates of the amounts to be recovered and the loss to the government.

“The government wants to know what the loss will be if the money payable by teachers to the government is waived,” education ministry sources said.

The officials also discussed the demand for an additional 18 lakh textbooks from Medak, Ranga Reddy and Warangal districts despite supplying about 1.73 crore textbooks this year.

The demands for the upgradation of some teachers in government schools were also discussed.