Kejriwal joins protesting teachers, calls strikes futile

A group of teachers from 'All Guest Teachers' Association' continued their hunger strike to demand permanent wages and increase in age limit as they protested against the government for not paying heed to their demands.

The teachers gathered at the historic Jantar Mantar, a regular protest site, here on Saturday, where they were joined by the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief, Arvind Kejriwal.

Although Kejriwal joined the protest, he left soon saying the strikes are of no help.

"I have also sat on strikes and protests. It does not help. And due to this I had to join politics. We have tried all this, but the government does not pay any heed to us," said Kejriwal.

After Kejriwal left the protest site, there was angst among the protesting teachers as they were not satisfied with Kejriwal's response.

"Whatever we have discussed you have heard it. Kejriwal has not given us a good response. When we asked him what could you do for us, he said, "I can sit with you on protest." We immediately asked him to comply and appreciated this. But suddenly he felt that it's no good sitting here, and he left," said one of the protesting guest teachers, Pravin Togadia.

Teachers teaching in different government schools, who get paid on daily basis, are demanding the renewal of many teachers, permanent salary and also increase in age limit to be eligible for selection under the scheme.

Kejriwal has been famous for sitting on hunger strikes even while he was the chief minister of Delhi but instead he persuaded the teachers to end their fast.

Kejriwal's leaving the strike without providing a concrete answer to the protesters left them with a lot of questions regarding his concern for the matter. Kejriwal even said that had he been in power he would have helped resolve the issue.

"This is a stunt for elections. He (Kejriwal) met us even before elections and had reassured us, if his party comes to power, he will make us permanent. And when his party came to power, we went to meet them regarding the matter. AAP leader Manish Sisodia said they had not promised to make us permanent but they will make the posts permanent. We questioned this as well as the posts are already permanent, how will you make them more permanent? Then we protested there also for 17 days, and then they gave us in written that we will not be removed. But again suddenly they betrayed us and suddenly gave up governance," added Togadia.