Dimapur, May 2 (MExN): The Nagaland Pradesh Congress Committee (NPCC) today condemned the “utter callousness of the NPF government for failing to address the grievances of the SSA teachers who have been deprived of their salary for the past five months.” The agitation launched by Nagaland SSA Teachers Association (NSSATA) which entered its third phase has so far “failed to elicit any response from the School Education Minister CM Chang or for that matter Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio who is more concerned about charting his escape route from all the mess generated as a result of his misrule,” stated a press statement issued by NPCC Media Cell. It also questioned the state government how much SSA fund it had received from the centre during 2013-14 for payment of salary, distribution of free textbooks and uniform, creation/ augmentation of infrastructure, besides normal administrative maintenance costs.
The statement noted that the NPCC had been highlighting the massive financial misappropriation by the NPF government, especially for the past one year and had predicted the present outcome of state government unable to pay the salaries of its employees. However, it lamented that the general public, barring some few concerned ones remained largely indifferent and rather enthusiastically voted for the DAN candidate Neiphiu Rio “who had emptied the state treasury in 11 years of blatant misrule.”
Leaving aside the indifferent attitude of the public towards corruption and misrule, the note said, the NPCC sympathize with thousands of SSA teachers struggling without salary for the past five months and extend its solidarity to the ongoing agitation that has so far “failed to even prick the conscience of NPF leaders.” Further NPCC added, “The immense hardship and trauma faced by the SSA teachers and their families have been unnecessarily imposed by an inefficient and corrupt NPF government who remain immune to the cries and sufferings of the teachers.”
“The deafening silence of the School Education minister CM Chang is indeed baffling. After resigning as Lok Sabha MP without completing his tenure and winning the bye-election to the state assembly by misusing all state resources at his disposal, the minister seems to have disappeared from public life,” the NPCC stated. “With the agitation of SSA teachers fast gaining momentum, the School Education Minister has to wake up from his reverie and tender an apology to the SSA teachers who have been victimized for no fault of theirs.”
The NPCC demanded that CM Chang resign from his position as minister for “miserably failing to handle the School Education department and for having lost all moral authority to occupy the ministerial chair when thousands of teachers and their families are made to suffer thereby jeopardizing the academic career of thousands of students across the state, majority of whom are from the least privileged background.”
