Telangana teachers to march in Delhi on Feb 5

Telangana teachers’ associations have issued a call for educators throughout the state to join the ‘Chalo Delhi’ Parliament March in significant numbers on February 5. The protest, organised under the banner of national teachers’ federations, aims to pressure the government on several critical issues, most notably the restoration of the Old Pension Scheme and the abolition of the Contributory Pension Scheme.

The demonstrators are demanding that senior teachers be exempted from the Teacher Eligibility Test and that the National Education Policy be cancelled. Other key grievances include the closure and merging of schools, the lack of voting rights for primary school teachers in MLC elections, and the urgent need to fill vacant teaching positions. Furthermore, the associations are calling for the implementation of minimum wages for contract and temporary staff. The protest is set to begin at 10 a.m. at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi, where various Members of Parliament and national leaders are expected to show their support.

A campaign poster was unveiled on Thursday at the PRTU office in Hyderabad to mark the start of the mobilisation effort. The event saw participation from numerous figures within the teaching community, including Chava Ravi, G Sadanandam Goud, P Damodar Reddy, S Biksham Goud, E Venkat, Juttu Gajender, Mallikarjun Reddy, Ch Anil Kumar, N Tirupati, M Somayya, T Lingareddy, Mohammed Abdullah, Katakam Ramesh, Mujeeb and Mumtaz Ali. The associations emphasised that this march serves a dual purpose of fighting for the fundamental rights of teachers and safeguarding the future of public education.