The ad hoc lecturers association in the Federally Administered Tribal Agency (Fata) continued its protest camp along the Sher Shah Suri Road for the 44th consecutive day on Wednesday for the release of their salaries and regularisation of services of 213 lecturers.
The protest camp has been set up outside Peshawar Press Club where both male and female lecturers carrying placards inscribed with demands for regularisation of services are determined to continue the protest even in Ramzan until acceptance of their demands. Talking to pressmen the lecturers representatives, Afsar Khan, Safiullah and Abdur Rasheed said the lecturers had boycotted classes since 10 May, and had set up camp to press for their demands, because the government was least bothered about their plight.
They informed that salaries of the lecturers had been withheld September of 2015 but they performed academic duties regularly. They informed that the association had contacted all relevant officials of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government to solve the long awaited problems but to no avail.
Afsar Khan said that following talks with Chief Minister Pervez Khattak, speaker Asad Qaiser, special assistant to CM on Higher Education Mushtaq Ahmed Ghani, a committee was also formed to work on regularisation of ad hoc lecturers. Ghani had assured to present a bill in the provincial assembly to resolve the issue within one month, but the summary was still pending in the establishment department.
"It is duty of government to encourage us because the lecturers performed services despite risk to life in the tribal regions," he said. He also warned that if the government did not resolve the issue they would set up camps outside the KP Chief Minister House and outside Imran Khan's Banigala residence in Islamabad.