Agitating school teachers arrested, released in Tripura

Over 700 school teachers who demonstrated against their impending termination of services defying Prohibitory orders under Section 144 CrPC were arrested on Tuesday.

Additional SP of West Tripura district, Manik Lal Saha said they were arrested for violating the prohibitory orders imposed to check the spread of coronavirus in the state.

However, police released all of them later. "We were forced to remove them as our attempt to persuade them failed. Despite repeated requests they did not agree to withdraw their agitation," Saha said.

A total of 10,323 undergraduate, graduate, and postgraduate teachers were appointed in different phases since 2010. The recruitment process was challenged in the Tripura High Court, which terminated their services saying the recruitment was faulty.

The then Left Front government moved the Supreme Court against the order but it upheld the high court verdict in March 2017.

The teachers were pronounced to retire after December 31, 2017, as per the apex court verdict, after which they were inducted on ad hoc basis.

After the BJP-IPFT government came to power in March 2018, it again appealed to the apex court in November and the Supreme Court granted them one-time final extension till March 31, 2020.

Two organizations of the teachers facing termination have been holding agitations since Friday. Speaking to reporters later, the teachers claimed that the BJP-IPFT coalition had made a poll pledge to re-instate them after coming to power.

Opposition leader Manik Sarkar and senior Congress leader Gopal Chandra Roy and others visited them and expressed their sympathy.