GUWAHATI, Dec 27: The Opposition Congress has demanded a white paper from the Assam government in regard to the “whimsical imposition” of the RIIMS application to ensure teachers’ attendance in schools and its subsequent withdrawal after several teacher associations moved the Gauhati High Court against the attendance system.
Addressing mediapersons here on Monday, Rajya Sabha MP from Congress and former Assam Pradesh Congress Committee president, Ripun Bora slammed the BJP-led government in Assam for compelling teachers, even in rural and remote areas which had network issues, to procure Android handsets and install the RIIMS app on their individual phones to register their attendance upon reaching school.
“Such a system compelled teachers to reach schools at 9.30am to register their attendance because if they were late even by a minute thereafter, they would be marked absent for the day. Besides, such a system had infringed on their personal freedom and privacy as their movement beyond school hours could be tracked. This had put immense pressure and compelled several teachers’ associations to take legal recourse,” Bora said.
Subsequently, a Gauhati High Court heard the petition of several teachers’ associations on December 22 and stated that it agreed to the submission made by the Advocate General of the state which mentioned that the registration of the teachers would be required to be done only in the official app downloaded by the school and such applications are “not required” to be individually downloaded by the teachers.
“So, we would like to question such a whimsical move on the part of the government to introduce a digital system, and later, withdraw it when the teachers moved court. We demand a white paper as to why the RIIMS application was introduced and how it would have helped improve the education system of the state,” the Congress leader asserted.
Bora also pointed out that the application was developed by a private firm and asked the government to be transparent in this regard as well.
The Rajya Sabha MP further said that the digital system was introduced as a pilot project in five districts in 2019 but “failed to be effective”.
Bora also demanded the government to re-examine the process of the Assam TET examinations for lower primary and upper primary levels, the results of which were declared recently.
“Some flaws in the process have surfaced and we demand that the examination process be re-examined,” he said.
Besides, the veteran Congressman demanded regularisation of services and salaries of the TET teachers, who he said were yet to get dearness allowance (DA) on a par with the regular teachers and other government employees.
“The BJP government had failed to live up to their poll manifesto of 2016 when they promised regularisation of all contractual TET teachers in the state. Besides, the teachers are on agitation mode demanding release of outstanding DA. Worse still, they are yet to get the percentage of DA the other government employees are getting,” Bora said.
“The Assam Right of Children to Free and Comp Education Rules clearly state that TET teachers will be entitled to regularisation of pay, service rules and pension, etc,” he added.
