ISLAMABAD: University teachers from across Pakistan, including Azad Kashmir and Gilgit Baltistan, have announced a massive protest scheduled to take place tomorrow in front of the Higher Education Commission’s (HEC) office in Islamabad.
The All Public Universities BPS Teachers Association (APUBTA) is organizing the demonstration to voice their concerns regarding the prolonged delay in the issuance of a notification approving their service structure and promotion policy.
Dr. Manzoor Ahmad, the media secretary of APUBTA, revealed that they plan to conduct an indefinite sit-in.
In anticipation of the protest, local teachers in Rawalpindi and Islamabad are preparing to welcome their colleagues from various cities and have made arrangements for their accommodation in hostels and hotels.
APUBTA has emphasized that their primary demand is the immediate issuance of a notification approving the service structure and promotion policy for all Basic Pay Scale (BPS) teachers.
The association’s press release highlights that the protest is a response to what they view as discriminatory and exploitative policies adopted by the HEC.
BPS teachers claim that the absence of a service structure, due to what they call HEC’s “criminal negligence,” has deprived them of their fundamental right to promotion.
Even though the HEC was mandated to develop promotion criteria under section 10(q) of the HEC Ordinance 2002, they argue that no substantial progress has been made in this regard over the past two decades, creating serious promotion and seniority issues for over 50,000 BPS faculty members in public sector universities.
This protest marks the latest in a series of demonstrations by APUBTA across the country in the past three years as they strive to address the promotion-related challenges faced by university teachers. BPS teachers assert that the HEC has made several written commitments to resolve their issues, but these commitments have yet to be fulfilled.
The Higher Education Commission has responded, stating that a committee of vice-chancellors recently forwarded recommendations to universities for the implementation of service structure and promotion policies. The HEC claims that they will consider the genuine demands of university teachers but assert that there is no fault on their part in the delay.
As the nationwide protest looms, the academic community watches with bated breath, hoping for a resolution to address the longstanding grievances of university teachers in Pakistan.
