Chennai govt teachers allege forced into SIR, BLO duty; school work suffering

CHENNAI: The Tamil Nadu Teachers' Federation has opposed the move to deploy teachers in government schools to carry out the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the voters list during school hours in Chennai.

As per federation members, secondary grade teachers (SGTs), mostly from government schools, Chennai corporation, Adi Dravidar Welfare (ADW), and aided schools in Chennai have been deployed to carry out the SIR as a 'matter of urgency'. However, teachers speaking to DT NEXT allege they are being called during school hours.

K Santhakumar, the deputy general secretary of the federation, said, "We are ready to carry out the Booth Level Officer (BLO) duty for the election during the weekends. But with just a month to finish SIR work, SGTs in Chennai are forced by the district administration and respective line departments to go for SIR."

Santhakumar, a teacher with an aided school in the city, requested the government and Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) of Tamil Nadu, Archana Patnaik, to consider deploying non-teaching staff for the work.

A Chennai corporation school’s teacher pointed out that six of nine SGTs from his school have been deployed for SIR work, causing additional burden on other staff. "Six teachers teaching classes 6, 7, and 8 have been deployed for SIR duty. The remaining three have been held back by the school head, citing their age. However, the absence of teachers has added to the burden on the existing staff."

Teachers allege that the departments sought the data of teachers under 50 years of age to deploy them on SIR and BLO duty. However, teachers above 50 years of age have also been engaged in the work, they noted.

As per the data accessed by DT Next, as many as 742 teachers below the age of 50 in government, Chennai corporation, ADW and aided schools were listed zone-wise for the assembly election. But teachers allege that at least 1,000 teachers, including those above 50 years of age, have been deployed for SIR work within Chennai corporation limits.

An official with the Chennai corporation said, "The form issuance work is in the final stages and will be completed within a week. After that, there is only data entry, for which teachers will not be involved. Teachers were specifically called for SIR work as they can reason and familiarise the process with the public better."