‘Increase guest faculty pay at Punjabi varsity’

Ravneet Singh
Tribune News Service
Patiala, August 22

Punjabi University is paying its guest faculty Rs 500 per lecture as opposed to the University Grants Commission (UGC) guidelines, according to which they should be paid Rs 1,500 per lecture.

The university has been paying its regular teachers according to the UGC norms and had also increased the salaries of contractual employees recently, but the guest teachers, comprising about 50 per cent of the total faculty, are awaiting the implementation of the guidelines.

In January this year, the UGC had issued a notification and enhanced the rates of the honorarium of guest faculty teachers to Rs 1,500, subject to a maximum of Rs 50,000 per month.

University officials on the condition of anonymity said the qualification and selection procedure of the guest faculty was same as the regular assistant professors. “The university should not pay them only Rs 500, which is one-third of the prescribed amount. According to the UGC norms, they cannot be given benefits of allowances, pension, gratuity and leave. Therefore, the university should pay them as per the recommended scale.”

Karman, a student, said, “Guest faculty should be paid according to the UGC norms as this affects our education.”

The university issued nearly 47 notifications to hire guest faculty in its various departments, colleges, and other centres since May. They are hired for a semester, which is a period of over six months. A faculty member at the university said, “The Army Institute of Law, Mohali, which is also associated with Punjabi University, pays its guest faculty as per the UGC norms.”

Committee to look into matter: Registrar

In February this year, the university raised the salary of its contractual teachers working in various constituent colleges after they held protests in November last year. Salaries of contractual teachers who were earlier paid Rs 21,600 monthly were first raised to Rs 30,000 and later the same was increased to Rs 44,000.

Registrar Dr Manjit Singh Nijjar said the university had formed a committee to look into the matter.