Regularization Row

Resenting the delay in regularization of their services, contract lecturers have demanded the TRS government to make it a reality before the start of the next academic year. The State government has not been talking about regularization for quite a long time after several stakeholders upped the ante against the proposal of regularization. There is severe dissent against regularization especially in the education department among junior college lecturers.

Though there are different opinions on the legal basis and possibilities of regularization, the contract lecturers are trying their best to convince the government and other stakeholders in this regard. Telangana Government College Contract Lecturer’s Association president C H Kanakachandram said that their demand was to remove the hurdles for regularization of contract lecturers. He said, “Several hundred contract lecturers have been giving their services for many years, but their services have not been recognized. Instead, the rule of district average pass percentage is being used to remove the contract lecturers.”

He demanded that the said rule should not be applied for contract lecturers and their services must be regularized at the earliest. There are various categories of government lecturers working in the junior colleges which includes lecturers recruited through public service commission, promoted teachers, promoted non-teaching staff, re-deployed, minimum time scale lecturers and hourly basis lectures. As per the district average, the pass percentage of the students is seen to calculate the efficiency and need of the contract lecturer. However, a 20 per cent relaxation is given to them. There are around 3,800 contract lecturers working across the State. 

On the other hand, Government College Lecturers Association president P Madhusudan Reddy opined that government should not delay the process of regularization in the interest of academics and students.He said that either by regularization or by recruitment through public service commission, State government must fill vacancies in all junior colleges before the next academic year. 

He said, “We are not against regularization now, but the State government has to change the service rules first if it wanted to do that so as to suit the Supreme Court ruling on this issue.”
Interestingly, delay in the recruitment process is irking all the pro and anti-regularization parties in the State.

TRS Resolutes to Restore Telangana Glory

Criticising previous governments for ensuring that backwardness remains in Telangana region, the TRS party vowed to restore its glory by according top priority to irrigation sector and water grid programme. Summing up the 12 resolutions that were passed during the plenary on Friday, Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao assured that his government would work for everyone. He said everything and every scheme that had been proposed would be fulfilled in a designated time period with utmost transparency. 

Talking about Mission Kakatiya, he said the revival of tanks across the State would be a milestone in the development of the State in terms of irrigation and agriculture, thus ensuring prosperity. Irrigation Minister T Harish Rao who moved the resolution said the separate Telangana movement was for water, resources and employment. He said, “The TRS government will compensate for the mistakes of the past governments. Almost 10 lakh acre land will be irrigated in Mahbubnagar, Nalgonda and Ranga Reddy districts under Palamuru Lift Irrigation project.” He said the Nakkal Gandi project in Nalgonda, Komarambhim project in Adilabad, Nettempadu, Devadula and other projects would be completed as early as possible for the relief of farmers. He launched a scathing attack on previous governments (Congress and TDP) for ignoring several irrigation projects in Telangana and only facilitating projects in the Seemandhra region.

Deputy Chief Minister Kadiam Srihari listed out various government schemes that were extraordinary and were never taken up by any previous government in the region. “Asara pension, Kalyana Lakshmi Pathakam and Shadi Mubarak schemes, compensation to the martyrs’ families, three-acre land to Dalit families, allocation of major chunk in budget for backward communities and minorities and others schemes were extraordinary,” he said. Stating that the TRS government has recognised the contributions of employees, he added the government has provided them several monetary sops. Speaking about one of the flagship schemes of government ‘KG to PG free education’, Kadiyam said his ministry was looking into this matter seriously and the government would like to make this programme an example across the country.

Agricultural Minister Pocharam Srinivas Reddy said that providing electricity without cuts to farmers was the top agenda of his government. The Deputy Chief Minister said providing benefiting MSP to the State farmers, the government had also waived off about Rs 17 crore debt for the welfare of 35.56 lakh farmers. Deputy Chief Minister Mohammed Mahmood Ali said the State government was firm on its endeavours for the development of minority communities. He said TRS government would definitely provide 12 per cent reservation to Muslims. Passing the resolution on electricity, energy minister G Jagadishwar Reddy said the State government was able to provide continuous power supply to all sections of society in a very short period of time under the able leadership of K Chandrashekar Rao. Ridiculing the claims of Seemandhra leaders, who threatened the people of Telangana with dire consequences in separate State in terms of electricity, he said currently the power production in State was 4,320 megawatts and by 2018 it would be 24,075 MW.

Satirical Case of Salary

Muslims and Tribals Plan Massive Agitation for Reservation

The demand for reservations in proportionate to population by Muslims and Tribals in Telangana is gaining voice with community leaders exploring options of holding huge agitational programs over the next one month. While Muslims have been demanding the early implementation of 12 per cent reservation without any legal hurdle, Tribal leaders are also in agitation mode demanding 10 per cent reservation to the Tribals in the State. Leaders of both the communities have expressed apprehensions that if government did not give proper reservations as promised in its election manifesto, they would be at loss in recruitment which has already begun with some departments.

"While Muslims demand the early implementation of 12 per cent reservation without any legal hurdle, Tribal leaders are also in agitation mode demanding 10 per cent quota"

Both the community leaders equally criticized the State government’s dilly-dallying tactics on this crucial issue pertaining to education and employment of the larger chunk of the population in the state. Muslim leaders opine that reservations for Muslims have to be given as early as possible since it was promised during the elections. Welfare Party of India State president Syed Shafiullah Quadri said that socio-economic conditions of the Muslims in the state was known to everyone in the light of the Sachar committee report.

Objecting to the formation of an enquiry committee to study the socio-economic conditions of Muslims in the State, he said that it was just another tactic to prolong the process of reservation. He said, “We are planning a massive agitation programmme from May 17 to 30 across the State against the laxity of government in ensuring constitutional rights to communities that are socially, economically and educationally backward.”

He said that if the work of providing reservations goes on at the same pace, Muslim youth would not be able to grab any opportunity in the new State that was formed showing so many dreams of prosperity. On the other hand, Tribal leaders have already begun their part of agitation demanding 10 per cent reservation to the Tribal communities. 

Telangana Girijana Sangham state president Shobhan Nayak said that in united Andhra Pradesh, the population of STs was only 6 per cent but in Telangana it was 9.34 per cent as per 2011 Census report. He said that according to the TRS government held Samagra Survey their population was 9.91 per cent. He said, “We are demanding 10 per cent reservations for the ST communities in light of these facts. Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao has promised to provide 12 per cent in his election manifesto.” He said that the State government is planning to fill one lakh job vacancies this year and on the other hand nothing has been done on the reservation front that would be straight loss for the community.

He said that the recruitment of 3,000 posts in Singareni has already been completed. Similarly, the State government has also made appointments to about 200 judiciary posts including government pleaders, assistant pleaders and standing counsels recently. It has sanctioned about 5,565 different posts in the department of Police, Irrigation and electricity recently. “Aspirants from our community have lost an opportunity. Who will take the responsibility for this loss,” he asked. 
The State government, on its part, has appointed Chellappa Committee to examine the inclusion of few communities in the ST category and the G Sudhir Enquiry Commission to provide reservations to the Muslim community in six months.

Sad Satire of Salary

TSPSC Releases Logo and Web Portal

Governor ESL Narasimhan on Saturday said that the newly formed Public Service Commission should prove its credibility by holding the recruitments in transparent and efficient manner. 

Launching the newly designed logo and website of Telangana State Public Service Commission (TSPSC) on Saturday at Rajbhavan, Narasimhan opined that establishing credibility was important for the commission in the long run. He advised the commission members to remember that public service commission should remain truly for the public service. He said, “Credibility of the commission in conducting examinations especially interview/viva should be carefully held.” He said that educated youth of the State have large expectations from the government and public service commission. 

Stating that the role of public service commission is crucial in building new State of Telangana, he said that Bangaru Telangana can be achieved by the proper and transparent functioning of the commission.
He said that for maintaining transparency in the conduct of examinations commission should prepare all its question papers outside the State. He quipped that, “You must remember that TSPSC can make or break Telangana.” The Governor asked the commission members to meet him again and discuss the issues in detail.

TSPSC chairman Ghanta Chakrapani on this occasion said that the commission would soon release the recruitment notification. He asked the Governor to provide accommodation to the TSPSC. The newly launched website of the commission www.tspsc.gov.in has special features like ‘One Time Registration’ (OTR) that enables candidates to register their name and education qualification. This would create a permanent database of the candidates applying for TSPSC for various jobs through OTR. Candidates would get information relating to every notification relevant to their qualification through mail or SMS.

Other features of the website are online application system and online help desk. This facility is the first of its kind which provides easy access and obtains receipts also online instead of cumbersome postal exercise. The official logo of the TSPSC also highlighted the blend of regional and cultural identity of the region and also underscored the fundamental tenets of morality, transparency, wisdom and integrity.

New School Syllabus in Telangana

Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao has given his consent to bring radical changes in the school syllabus by giving due credence to Telangana history, art, culture and literature. The changes in the syllabus were advised by the experts committee set up by the State Council for Education Research and Training (SCERT) which suggested that chapters about the history of erstwhile Andhra Pradesh should be replaced with that of Telangana history, culture, architecture, art and literature.

With the CM’s consent, the text books of Class I to 10 would have the syllabus designed by the state authorities from the coming academic year 2015-16. The changed syllabus would have couplets and poems of native poets of Telangana besides historical, architectural and artistic parts of Telangana. The new syllabus proposed long ago, is awaiting CM’s nod for its implementation. 

However, after a recent meeting held at Secretariat attended by state government’s cultural advisor N V Ramana Chary, SCERT director S Jagannath Reddy and other officials from school education department, the proposals were discussed at length before sending them to the chief minister.

The history books would also include the history of Telangana dating back to the induction of Hyderabad State into the Indian Union and all the major events up to the formation of Telangana. History of movements during Nizam’s government, Hyderabad’s merger, first democratic government, agitations pertaining to Mulki rules, role of Osmania University students, 1969 Telangana movement, 1972 Jai Andhra movement would be included in the history. 

Interestingly, the syllabus of Social Studies also includes the details of State Government’s schemes pertaining to tanks and ponds (Mana Vuru Mana Cheruvu) and this aspect also occupy a significant space of the syllabus. Major breakthroughs during the Telangana movement were also made the part of syllabus. Meanwhile, the Telugu Desam criticized the TRS government and alleged that KCR was busy in incorporating his own history in the name of Telangana history. TDP spokesperson N Narsi Reddy said that almost 1,200 students have sacrificed their lives for the cause of Telangana.

Undermining students’ sacrifice and omission of the participation of poets, artists and other people’s version in Telangana history was shameful, he said. Reddy said that history would not forgive people who were indulging in praising the Chief Minister K Chandra Sekhar Rao while ignoring the actual martyrs of Telangana.