By Zaidul Haque, TwoCircles.net,
Kolkata: Due to negligence of Government of West Bengal Md Jalaluddin, a farmer gets his appointment letter as a primary school teacher just when he is about to reach the age of 60.
According to state policy, a primary school teacher retires at 60. That means Jalaluddin can work only for two weeks, after which he will retire.
Md Jalaluddin from Paloibari village in Hatia area under the Itahar Block of North Dinajpur district of West Bengal. He was born on December 1, 1952. He worked in Census Curriculum. According to state policy, a noted census worker will be get jobs under the census workers quota.
Md Jalaluddin with his wife Lalo Begum and son Barkat. His appointment letter is in hand.
In 1995 Jalaluddin applied for the primary teachers’ recruitment under census worker quota. But Government of West Bengal of that time, under Left Front regime, did not list up the census category result on time.
He hence filed a complaint to the North Dinajpur District Primary School Board and to letter to the Chief Minister office regarding pending result of the census workers quota.
When he did not get any response, he finally filed a petition in the Calcutta High Court. On the directives of the High Court, Jalauddin again sat for the teacher recruitment examinations in 2010.
His long wait ended on November 17, 2012 when he finally got the appointment letter for the post of the primary school teacher. However, as the government puts the restriction of retiring at 60, implies that practically Jalaluddin gets to work only for about two weeks.
At the time of retirement hence he would not be eligible to get the benefits of pension, gratuity as he would not be able to serve the mandatory period of at least 10 years.
Jalaluddin has a small farm land, where he has been working for years to maintain his family.
His son Md Barkatuddin, a post-graduate degree holder in History, is still elated. He tells TCN with some degree of pride, “Everyone in my village knows me as the son of a poor farmer. But now I can say that my father was a school teacher.”
Both the father and the son blame the Left front government for the negligence for the ‘injustice’ and delays that deprived Jalauddin from the government job all these years.
Jalauddin also pleaded to the current Chief Minister, Mamata Banerjee to correct the injustice done to him and treat his case as special and allow him the facilities of pension so that in his old age, at least he can rest in peace.