Guest faculty fear losing jobs, to gherao Punjab CM’s residence if demands not met

The Punjab and Haryana High Court’s decision regarding the recruitment of 1,091 assistant professors has left the guest faculty assistant professors, who have been teaching in government colleges since 2002, in distress. The jobs of hundreds of such assistant professors (guest faculty) are under threat as the state government has issued the appointment orders to hundreds of the newly recruited ones.

In such a situation, the guest faculty assistant professors are unsure of their future. It has been mentioned in the order that it has been mentioned that the newly appointed assistant professors will join on the regular posts. Leaders of Guest Faculty Joint Front, Punjab, Gulshandeep Kaur Dania (Sangrur), Ravinder Singh (Mansa) and Gursewak Singh (Patiala) here on Wednesday served an ultimatum on the Mann government, stating that in case it did not resolve the matter or Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann did not meet them till October 5, they would be compelled to take some harsh steps and gherao the CM’s residence at Sangrur on October 6.

Devinder Kumar Deepu, one of the affected assistant professors, said nearly 850 guest faculty assistant professors had been working in state’s government colleges for past many years. Many of them had no other source of income to make both ends meet. He said more than 480 newly appointed assistant professors had joined the colleges in the past few days.

Gulshandeep Dania said wards of many guest faculty assistant professors had been studying in senior secondary schools or colleges. Many of them had taken loans to buy houses. So, when the government would now show them the door without their any fault of theirs, how would these hundreds of assistant professors spend their lives without any source of income. She said she had received information from some quarters that some guest faculty assistant professors had also been suffering from depression for the past few days.

An assistant professor said it seemed that the state government had been pushing them towards taking an extreme step as many of newly appointed assistant professors had joined the posts, against which they had been working for the past more than a decade or so.

The front leaders also urged the CM and Higher Education Minister to issue a letter, assuring them that the guest faculty assistant professors would continue their duties in the government colleges so that they could feel that their jobs would remain secure.