Thaindian News

New Delhi, Sep 22 (IANS) A day after 1,300 teachers of the Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) decided to go on hunger strike, two IIT directors Tuesday said the faculty had apparently misunderstood the government proposal on pay and autonomy and that the matter would be sorted out soon.
“IITs are not unhappy with the HRD (Human Resource Development) ministry over the payment issue,” IIT Guwahati director Gautam Baruah told IANS over telephone.

“It is not fair to say that the ministry rejected the proposal of the IIT faculty. You can say they did not accept it. There are some minor issues and we believe things will be sorted out soon,” he added.

Baruah said all the directors of IIT would meet with the faculty federation soon. “We are trying to find out a convenient time and hopefully meet later this week.”

“I believe the faculty federation has misunderstood a few clauses of the government proposal. The misunderstanding will be sorted out very soon,” said another IIT director, who did not wish to be named.

On Monday, over 1,300 teachers of IITs decided to go on a hunger strike Thursday to protest the government’s apathy towards their demand for a better pay package.

“We will go on a hunger strike on Thursday to protest. The classes will not be affected though,” M. Thenmozhi, head of the IITs faculty federation, told reporters after their meet at IIT-Kharagpur.

Earlier, several IITs had gone on mass casual leave to protest against the “government apathy” towards them.

According to authorities, there are two major issues that are agitating the faculty - the pay package of assistant and associate professors and a cap on the number of professors who can be promoted to the next level.

“The government has put a cap that only 40 percent of professors can be promoted to senior professor level. This is not fair. In IITs, we are talking about quality and if someone is really good, why halt his or her growth in the guise of mere numbers,” asked a senior faculty member of the federation.