Teachers with 9 yrs, 6 months service to get pension: Min

Kolkata: On Teachers’ Day, the state Education minister, Bratya Basu, announced that pensions would be provided on a case-to-case basis for school teachers with at least 9 years and 6 months of continuous service.

Earlier the requirement was 10 years of continuous service. And, those with a deficit of 6 months had to seek legal recourse.

“We considered their plight and decided on humanitarian grounds that if a teacher’s work life reaches 9 years and 6 months or more, from now on, based on application, for eligible candidates, the department will waive the deficit and start the pension. They need not go to the High Court,” Bratya said.

Additionally, an ‘Integrated Grievance Redressal Cell’ as a WhatsApp chatbot was inaugurated to address complaints of teachers. The number, 9088885544, will be operational 24 hours, 365 days a year. Complainants will receive regular updates on the status of their complaints.

Another issue regarding Digi-Locker has been resolved. “If any corrections were made by the WBBSE on the applications from the candidates, the corrected information wasn’t reflected in the documents stored in the Digi-Locker,” said Basu. The event, held at Bikash Bhawan, was attended by several key figures in the education sector.