Mita Mukherjee
The West Bengal government decided to not celebrate the Teachers” Day programme in a big way this year in view of the “tragic” incident in which a 31-year old junior doctor of RG Kar was raped and murdered. Instead a small programme was held today to mark the occasion at Bikash Bhavan, the headquarters of the state education department.
Every year the state government celebrates Teachers’ Day in a centralized programme where toppers of board examinations and eminent teachers are felicitated and best performing schools are awarded. The award giving ceremony was not held today.
The state government had earlier decided to organize the 2024 Teachers’ Day programme at Biswa Bangla Mela Prangan. Chief minister Mamata Banerjee was scheduled to be present at the function.
Attending the small programme at Bikash Bhavan, education minister Bratya Basu today said that the government will organize a programme after a few days when students and eminent teachers will be felicitated and the best performing schools will be awarded.
“You all know that we have witnessed an unwanted and unfortunate incident where a girl of our own family lost her life in a very tragic way. Our chief minister and we all have stood beside her family…. And we all want justice…. In such a situation we have decided to not celebrate the Teachers’ Day programme in a big and centralized way this year which we usually did in the previous years. Instead, we have arranged a small programme at Bikash Bhavan today to observe the day,” Basu said.
“ Over the past many years we have felicitated toppers of all board exams and eminent teachers on this day. The felicitation of this year’s awardees will be held after a few days. The implementation of our Taruner Swapno scheme has been kept on hold,’ the minister added.
Under the Taruner Swapno scheme that was launched in 2021 during the Covid -19 pandemic, students of classes XI and XII are given Rs 10,000 to purchase tabs. More than Rs 1300 crores have been allocated for this project.
There were speculations that the government would not present the awards this year. The minister said “this is not true,” and he urged people not to spread such rumors.
The commission of school education issued an order announcing the government’s decision to postpone today’s programme, but no reason for postponing the event was mentioned in the order.
The entire state is now witnessing protests by school, college and university students, ordinary people and political groups against the R G Kar rape and murder.
The decision to postpone the programme became a point of discussion in the administration and ordinary people considering the movement continuing in the state after the rape and murder of the RG Kar doctor came to light.
There were speculations that the government cancelled the Teachers’ Day programme in view of the present situation.
The minister today announced that according to existing rules teachers of government and aided schools are eligible to avail the pension scheme after completing 10 years of uninterrupted service. The rule has been revised and from now on teachers can come under the pension scheme after completing nine years and six months of continuous service.
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