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Lecturers rule out lifting boycott

The Karnataka government will wait till Monday morning before deciding on initiating action against Pre-university college lecturers who have been boycotting evaluation of examination answer scripts for the last three days.

The president of the lecturers’ association has ruled out calling off the boycott. “Most lecturers went back to their hometowns during the weekend. We will wait till Monday morning for them to report for evaluation work, failing which we will have no option but to take a decision on initiating action against them,” Primary and Secondary Education Department Secretary G Kumar Naik said.

According to official sources, the government will initially warn the teachers of disciplinary action. If they do not heed to the government’s diktat, then it will, as a last resort,  invoke the Karnataka State Civil Services (Prevention Of Strike) Act 1978 and declare the strike illegal. Under the Act, there is a provision to even arrest the teachers for shunning work.
However, the government is dilly-dallying in taking any harsh decision as it fears the wrath of teachers ahead of the Legislative Council elections to three teachers’ and an equal number of  graduate constituencies later in June. Chief Minister D V Sadananda Gowda made a futile effort on Sunday evening, before leaving for New Delhi, to convince the agitating PU lecturers to withdraw their boycott. Primary and Secondary Education Minister Visveshvara Hegde Kageri said the government had an open mind to the demands of the teachers, and promised to hold discussions on April 19. “In principle, we do not want to take a confrontational path with the teachers but will be forced to take some harsh steps to protect the interest of students,” Kageri said.

Pre-university Department Commissioner Rashmi V Mahesh said that all evaluators (including deputy chief examiners and assistant evaluators) would have to compulsorily take part in evaluation from Monday. “It’s the final notice, failing which disciplinary action will be initiated,” she said in a statement.

But the lecturers, who have been boycotting the evaluation since April 13 for better salaries and other demands, have struck a defiant note, and said they would continue the strike as the government had “failed” to meet their demands.

Karnataka State Pre-university College Lecturers’ Association Working President S H Prakash said there was no question of lifting the evaluation boycott. “The government is still indifferent. We are not going to budge,” he said.  The core committee of the association will meet on Monday to decide the next course of action.

Rashmi Mahesh claimed more lecturers turned up for evaluation on Sunday (a working day), compared with Saturday. “It was definitely better than Saturday. The evaluation went on in all the centres in Bangalore” she said. About 30 per cent of the evaluators are said to have taken part in evaluation.

Prakash, however, was unimpressed by Rashmi Mahesh’s claims. “Our unity is still intact,” he said.

Kumar Naik said his department had identified certain members of the teachers’ fraternity who, he alleged, had been instigating other teachers to shun evaluation work. “We have been observing them. If they continue to create trouble, we will have to initiate action,” he said.

In 2000, during a similar agitation by PU lecturers, the then Congress government had invoked provisions of ESMA and arrested more than 250 teachers. The PU lecturers, then, had stayed away from valuation work for more than three weeks. Once ESMA was invoked, the teachers reported back to work almost immediately. However, ESMA is inoperative this time as the Act lapsed in 2004. It was revived by the State legislature in 2009, but now awaits presidential assent, with the Home ministry raising some technical issues.