He is a muslim with a fashionable beard on his Islamic face but his hands did not tremble while accepting huge salary every month for last 25 years against which he taught not even for a single period, a single student
A teacher is regarded as the architect of a society. The qualitative nature of a society, the value system of a society and the behavior of the members of the society is solely the result of the kind and character of the people who are concerned with imparting to the children the convictions, the principles and practices which the society is expected to pursue. The character of a teacher has to be such as to influence the tiny minds of the students for the better. Would you believe that our Education Department has a person on its payroll who has never taken a class of students for the last twenty five years and yet he is getting monthly salary, increments, arrears and even the time bound promotions as per the Civil Service Rules of the state without a fail.
No; he is not an unqualified teacher to disable him from taking a class but he is sufficiently and genuinely qualified. He has post graduate degree to his credit. Then why hasn’t he taken any class during these twenty five years? Was he not given the opportunity to perform what he was appointed for? or he was given some administrative task of the Department? No; none of these is a reason.
Infact, the teacher had a small family business at the time he joined the department which he was engaged with at the time of appointment as teacher. But he did not disassociate with the said business but continued it and not only continued it but continued it in a big way giving it a modern touch by undergoing various refresher courses in the field. Soon he achieved his business goals and his business began to flourish like anything. He then started some other businesses too where he also made big money. He now is a wealthy man and a successful businessman and the people know him as nothing but a businessman. There is no person around who can believe that he is a teacher too. Nobody has ever seen him in an official dress, going to or coming from a school where he has been posted during these 25 years. No student of an institution where he was posted recognizes him as his teacher. He has always been seen in or around the business 24/7.
How can it be possible that a man has not attended his duties for twenty five years except for collecting salary and may be on an inspection day etc. and there is no cry around? It may sound strange elsewhere but in our state of J&K, it is not perplexing. It is understood, the teacher would give 25% of his salary to the concerned controlling officers for keeping his attendance, leave and other service records up to date and take only 75% to home with an eye on the promotions, increase in salaries and finally the terminal benefits running into lakhs particularly the life long pension.
There is another aspect of the story. The man, who at one time did not have something to wear, does not hesitate to spend lakhs of rupees on the social functions inviting the society’s nobles to these functions to authenticate his credentials as a wealthy and influential man and substantiating that he belongs to the creamy layer of the society to command respect from the poor and honest neighborhood.
He definitely has engineered his life and that of his children but what about the poorest of poor students of government schools, who because of their poverty can not afford public school education, who have longed to see their teacher so that they might benefit from his knowledge which he was paid for during all these twenty five years?
