Srinagar: The success rate of the School Education Department in maintaining a proper Pupil Teacher Ratio (PTR) in government schools would be a deciding factor to get financial support from the Centre for the salary of the teachers in the school education department.
The decision has been taken after the Centre granted extension to the Samagra Shiksha for a period of five years after integrating its interventions in line with the National Education Policy (NEP)-2020.
As per the official document, the Department of School Education and Literacy (DSEL), Government of India (GoI), would provide financial assistance to the states and union territories (UTs) towards the salary of teachers – headmasters and teachers, who are at the heart of the learning process and ensure maintenance of PTR norms at the school level.
“Teachers will be recruited as per the terms and conditions of the respective states and UTs. The entitlement will be determined after an assessment of the requirement of the posts and adequate deployment of teachers as per the PTR norms,” the official document reads. “This will be based on the data provided by the state for teachers under UDISE+.”
As per the official document, the DSEL has stated that there would be no separate cadre of teachers sanctioned by the Centre and all the teachers would be the responsibility of the respective state governments.
“Teachers will be adequately deployed to ensure that all schools follow the PTR norms,” it reads.
The DSEL has also put a condition on keeping vacancies unfilled in the department saying that the vacancies in the state cadre of teachers should not be more than 10 percent of the total sanctioned posts.
“Qualified counselors may be provided at the secondary and senior secondary level in a phased manner and the services of counselors may be extended to all schools at the cluster level,” the document reads.
“The counselor will visit all schools in a cluster, at least once in every 15 days,” it said. Over the years, the Centre has recruited thousands of general line teachers or subject-specific teachers in the School Education Department to enhance the learning outcomes of the students.
The DSEL has decided that the central share for the salary under the Samagra scheme for teachers’ salaries for the posts sanctioned by the Centre under the erstwhile schemes of SSA and RMSA would be restricted as per the prevalent fund sharing pattern based on the financial norms. “Support for salary of teachers will be provided to the states as a lump sum grant,” it said.