The Centre’s modified order dated September 16 has only allowed for a pay increase for assistant professors after they complete three years of service but has ignored most other demands.
For the last few years, the IIT faculty associations have been disgruntled about their pay structures being too inadequate to attract quality faculty and had held protests earlier this month demanding higher compensation. The IITs had hoped that the Goverdhan Committee report submitted this February — which recommended higher salaries for all technical education teachers — would help resolve the issue.
However the notified revised pay structure announced by HRD in early August was much lower than expectation. The remuneration for directors was fixed at Rs 80,000 for the IITs, IIMs, the Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research (IISc) in Bangalore and the National Institute of Industrial Engineering, which did not go down well. For, unlike the IIM professors who earn through consulting assignments, salary is an IIT professor’s only income.
Faculty associations were also unhappy with an HRD clause that said there would be a 40 per cent cap on professors who are eligible to receive higher pay after six years in the post. Also, at assistant professor level, the ministry had notified qualifications of a minimum three years work experience and a PhD.
This meant that IITs were not be able to take fresh graduates or doctorates as permanent faculty members.
The IITs also found disparities in the pay structure between the University Grants Committee (UGC) system and the IITs. While a BTech-level assistant professor could start on Pay Band 3 in a university, at the IITs only PhDs joined this band on a contract basis and had to work for three years to become an associate professor.
The institutes also protested that the Central Pay Commission had given all employees of the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro), Defence Research and Development Organisation have been given special additional pay ranging from about Rs 2,000 per month to about 10 per cent of basic pay as a special grant for special achievements. Premier educational institutions, on the other hand, had not been granted any such special treatment for the highly-valued brands they have created, including mentoring new IITs.
Other demands included that the professional development allowance of Rs 300,000 (for international/national conferences, contingencies, membership fees) be increased to Rs 500,000 for a block of three years; that the ‘lecturer’ position be abolished and lecturers re-designated ‘assistant professors’ at an appropriate scale; and that the recruitment of faculty with PhD degrees with less than three years of experience start with a minimum pay of Rs 30,000 and academic grade pay of Rs 8,000.
The IITs had also demanded a scholastic pay of Rs 15,000 per month to attract fresh PhD scholars into the teaching profession. This special pay is expected to compensate the IIT faculty for the “notional” financial loss they incur compared to people of comparable qualifications in other sectors.
Discontent over pay packages have been building up for some weeks. In early September, faculty at some IITs staged protests — including going on mass casual leave — against the new pay regime passed by the Union Cabinet last month based on the recommendations of the Goverdhan Mehta Committee report which was submitted in February.
The All India IIT Faculty Federation (AIITFF) temporarily suspended its agitation on September 5 after a meeting with Union HRD Minister Kapil Sibal suggested that the issue would be resolved, though there were no assurances from ministry.
Faculty members of the institutions view the ministry’s failure to consider lifting the 40 per cent cap on tenured faculty members as a major lapse.
“There has been hardly any modification in the current notification as none of our major demands have been met. At least the ministry should not have overlooked the pay rise for senior faculty members as they will eventually be at par with the faculty of other universities which fall under UGC,” rued a senior faculty member at IIM-A, which had submitted a memorandum to the ministry earlier this month.
“We reiterate the fact that IIM and IIT professors spend more years working to get to these premier institutes and deserve a better pay based on their performance. This way, we will only lose better faculty to the industry,” he added.
Today, the faculty association at IIT Madras held a meeting with its members to decide the next course of action. “We were a little relieved that the demand for the pay of assistant professors has but many other factors were not considered. After discussing with our faculty members we will speak to other IITs and take the necessary steps,” said a faculty member at IIT Madras.
The IIMs, meanwhile, are yet to react, but the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore faculty association has decided to hold a meeting, probably on September 22, to discuss the issue. “We had submitted four or five major issues in our memorandum to the HRD ministry of which one has been tackled. We will take a decision on what to do next in consultation with our members,” said J Nagaraju, president of the IISc faculty association.
Source : Business Standard
3 comments :
To make up for the financial burden because of 'further' incease in the salaries of the senior babus it was obvious that there should be a cut in the salaries of IIT/ IIM Professors. After all the country is passing through a tough time - drought, high prices reccession etc. So the professors should pay for the 'second increase' in the salaries of babus of the Govt of India. Have the politicians closed their eyes? or they are also vying for increase in thier emoluments.
It is a welcome step that the entry level salary of an Asst prof has now been raised to Rs 37000+AGP 8000 in PB4. But the new pay regim does not seem to be caring about the faculty who are already serving for last so many years. Now the salry of a new entrant Asst Prof and the one with 17 years of service has become same!!
Similarly for Associate Prof and Professors also the seniority or length in service does not seem to be reflecting in their saalaries. In fact the 'bunching' of thier salary should now start over and above the 'minimum basic pay' offered to a fresh entrant. The Govt should not only 'attract' the new faculty but also try to 'retain' the already serving faculty. That is also equally important. IIT teachers Association and their Federation should also get this grievance addressed with MHRD. Even the UGC Fitment table fix more salary than the Table S-26 gives for same basic pay. Govt of India's fitment table also have a lot of anamolies. One Example is :
(a) For the old scale of 14300-18300, the new salary for basic pay of 19100 is now 44700.(Table S-24).
(b) For the old scale of 15100 -
18300 the new salary for same basic pay of 19100 is 46500 (Table S-25)
(c) Applicable to IIT teachers - For the old pay scale 16400-20000 (Please note the minimum and maximum are both higher than (a) and (b) above ) for the same basic pay of 19100 it is the 'less' than both above Rs 43390 only ( Table S-25).
It is surprising that the employees already working in a senior scale have been given fitment of lower pay - No reason can be convincing for this mesh made by babus.
September 4, 2009 2:37 PM
Dear Kapil Sibal Ji,
WILL You walk a mile only for IITs ... ??????
WHY CANT YOU WALK A FEW STEPS----- ONLY A FEW STEPS.... FOR NITs.... .... IN PARTICULAR YOUNG FACULTY MEMBERS..... ARE WE NOT YOUR KIDS.....
NIT faculty members were made to wait for almost an year more than UGC. Finally MHRD discovered that we are same like UGC and has given the same UGC scales.....
Various NITs made a number of memorandums.(In a dignified manner as reported by IIM)
But, not even a single time their concerns were heard, in the TWO modifications MHRD has given dated 16th and 22nd.
The pay commission was framed to attract young faculty members with PhD and to retain existing faculty.
As far as NITs are converned MHRD has done everything possible to retain existing senior faculty members.
For young faculty members, MHRD said seven non compoundable advance increment will be given for a person with PhD.
Unfortunately, we don,t know, whether our English is bad or MHRDs, the existing faculty members with PhDs are given a mere TWO increments only. The argument is that a person who is going to be recruited after this GO and who joins with a PhD only will be given 7 increments. Even if a person submits his thesis and gets his PhD the next day of joining NIT, he will be eligible for only TWO increments.
Young faculty members with PhD represented MHRD through various memorandums to keep them at 7000 AGP AT LEAST.
BUT NOTHING HAPPENED FOR THIS DIGNIFIED(AS REPORTED BY IIM)PETITIONS TILL DATE. INSTEAD WE ARE PUNISHED STILL MORE BY GIVING JUST TWO INCREMENTS.
OKAY, If we think that We will leave this institution and join another as a fresher to get atleast the SEVEN increments promised for a fresher, UGC has recently come up with another regulation saying, Discretionary award of advance increments can be given only to Asso Profs and Professors and not to a person joining fresh AS ASSISTANT PROFESSOR(6.4.19 IN REGULATION 2009).
WHY..... What wrong thing we made....Spending 5 to 10 years in various industries and institutions before joining NIT is a fault...OR Did a bit of research to get a PhD in service is a fault... WHAT WRONG THING WE MADE....
SO, U WONT GIVE US PROPER SALARY... U wont allow us to join ANOTHER INSTITUTION also peacefully....(B,COS WE WILL LOSE OUR SERVICE AND WE MAY NOT GET ADVANCE INCREMENTS OTHER THAN FOR PHD......) So, MHRD should tell us what service we should do in our existing institutes...
THOSE WHO JOINED NIT AFTER SUBMITTING THEIR THESIS AND GOT THEIR PhD IN SERVICE IN A MONTH OR TWO AFTER JOINING NIT DONT KNOW
WHETHER WE ARE A FRESH FACULTY
OR
AN EXISTING FACULTY......
WE ARE NOT PROVIDED EITHER THE BENEFITS SHOWN TO EXISTING FACULTY(SENIORS)
NOR
THE BENEFITS GIVEN TO FRESH FACULTY.....
AND WE CANT LEAVE FOR ANOTHER INSTITUTION ALSO(for the reason mentioned above)
ONLY GOD CAN SAVE US ...........
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