ICU teachers set deadline for renewal of contracts

PESHAWAR: The teachers of historic Islamia College University on Tuesday urged the administration to issue renewed contracts to the protesting employees or else they would launch a complete class boycott drive.

The protesting teachers set the March 1 deadline for acceptance of the demand after which they would go for a class boycott. The demand was made at the emergency general body meeting of the Teaching Staff Association (TSA), the representative body of the university teachers. The president of the association, Dr Dil Nawaz Khattak, presided over the meeting.

The teachers under the aegis of TSA have been protesting for the last one week to press the university administration to accept the demand. The university administration, on the other hand, expressed its inability to accept the demand by the protesting teachers.

An official of the university told The News that they have been barred by the Universities Act not to renew the contract of any employee beyond three years of his service on a contractual basis.

The teachers at the general body meeting criticized the university administration and said it had badly failed to run the affairs of the university in a smooth and efficient manner. They said the renewal of the contracts of the university teachers, who are just 26 in number, especially at a time when the institution was already short of regular employees, was an injustice with the contractual employees.