Guwahati: The Department of Elementary Education Assam has canceled transfers of teachers made between 2018 and 2019 amidst concern over Pupil Teacher Ratio (PTR).
Through an order letter (PMA 108/2018/PT-6) issued by the Elementary Education Department, Preetom Saikia, IAS Commissioner and Secretary has stated that all the transfer processes have been canceled citing reason that the students to teacher ratio has been violated.
Speaking to News Live Pritam Saikia said, “Initially, there were many vacancies in lower Assam areas like in Dhubri and other parts of Assam and we gave the elementary teachers preferences to choose their job location. At that time the teachers took their appointments according to their preferences. But later, these teachers started appealing for transfers as they wanted to go back to their home districts and many of them were successful in getting transfers.”
“There is a thing called PTR (Pupil-Teacher Ratio) and by these transfer orders the PTR got affected. Because of this the ratio of teachers in many schools is now much lower than that of the students. So now, based on this order the department has decided to restore the PTR and we are reverting back these teachers to their respective schools. But to be clear, we will only cancel those school transfer orders where PTR has been violated and these teachers can be under the Elementary Education Department or on contractual basis under SSA,” stated Saikia.
It may be mentioned that the Education Minister Dr. Himanta Biswa Sarma had recently pointed out that the process of transfer of some teachers had taken place outside the norms and also clarified that these teachers should return to the schools where they had worked in the past.
Following the announcement made by Dr. Sarma, the Department of Education canceled the transfers and pointed out that the teachers have violated the teacher-student ratio under the Right to Education Act.
The directive clarified that the teachers were appointed for a specific district on the basis of merit, though this rule has been violated to the utmost.
However, an appeal can be made within 10 days from as and when specific transfer orders of teachers are issued, said Preetom Saikia.
