Bhubaneswar, June 18: Teachers at various aided colleges of the state (both junior and degree colleges) have demanded parity in promotion benefits on par with their government counterparts.

The teachers have alleged that while it takes 18 years for a teacher in a government college to become a reader, a private teacher has to wait for 27 years to achieve the same.

There are 2,322 colleges in the state with only 99 government colleges. The private ones include 620 aided colleges, 991 unaided colleges, 166 block grant colleges, 453 self-financing colleges and 42 “other” colleges.

On June 4, the state government came up with a new set of guidelines called the Odisha Non–government Aided College Lecturers’ Placement Rules, 2014, applicable for lecturers and junior lecturers. The order will have retrospective effect from January 1 this year.

According to the rules, teachers in private colleges have to wait for 27 years to be promoted to the position of a reader. The teacher will have to wait for nine years until he/she gets the state scale and be regularised.

These teachers will have to wait for eight years to be promoted to a lecturer and another 10 years to become a reader.

However in case of government colleges, a teacher is promoted to senior lecturer after eight years of his joining and 10 years hence, he or she is promoted to the reader’s post.

“Such a difference is grossly illegal when all of us put in the same amount of time and energy in teaching the students. Moreover, the teachers have the same qualifications and experience. Nine years is a long time and it cannot be deducted just like that,” said Duryodhan Parida of the Nikhil Utkal Sikshak Mahasangh.

Teachers in non-government colleges are recruited either by the Staff Selection Board (SSB), or directly by the private college management, who later get it approved by the director higher education

Prior to the new rule, the government used to deduct five years of service of private teachers while considering them for promotion.

“Now they have increased it from five years to nine years. If the new rule is followed, almost 90 per cent of the private teachers in various private schools will be never be able to reach the position of reader and have to retire either as junior lecturers or lecturers which is very unfortunate,” said Parida

“The rules have been framed according to the Odisha Education Act, 1969, and the logic behind the rule was to ensure that the candidate has successfully completed nine years of service in a private school in order to be eligible for a government pay scale,” a senior government official said.