A 55-year-old teacher in Kanyakumari district has filed a petition with the District Collector, seeking an order towards payment of her pending salary from two schools managed by the Kanyakumari diocese. The teacher is allegedly yet to receive her salary for around a year-and-a-half which amounts roughly to Rs 13 lakh.
Jaya Thanga was a PG teacher in Ringeltaube Higher Secondary School for boys in Mailadi, Kanyakumari district before she was transferred on promotion to LMS School in Palapallam, Mathiode, Kanyakumari district as the headmistress. Both these schools are aided by the state government and run by the Kanyakumari diocese of Church of South India (CSI).
In the interim period, from October 2018 to February 2019, Jaya Thanga went on medical leave for 124 days with approval from the authorities. After rejoining from medical leave, she resumed duty as the headmistress in LMS School from February 2019. However, she was shocked to know that her salary was allegedly not being credited to her account on time.
Speaking to TNM, Jaya Thanga said that the reason why she had not raised the issue for this long was because she was planning to get it addressed once the class 12 public exams in Tamil Nadu got over. “But then we didn't expect a lockdown by that time. Hence I couldn’t move any papers by then,” she said. Jaya Thanga allegedly has around Rs 13 lakh pending in salaries from her school as on date and told TNM that she has no means to pay the fee for her college-going children.
However, M Stalin Sam, the Correspondent of Ringeltaube, told TNM that Jaya Thanga’s papers have not been transferred to the new school because she didn’t join back to duty in her school after the medical leave.
“As per the process, I was told by the District Education Officer's office (DEO) that once a staff is back from the sanctioned leave, he or she has to join back in the school where leave was sanctioned and sign. Then only they should proceed for taking over the new position. She didn’t come here and sign after her leave ended and directly went there. So as per our register, she has not joined back after leave. Hence we were told to hold the papers back from the DEO office,” he said.
When TNM contacted Raman, the Chief Educational Officer (CEO) of Kanyakumari district, he said that the papers related to her medical leave were submitted at the DEO's office only last month. “We got the documents from the Correspondent only last month. Hence, that is under process. But the documents related to her promotion as headmistress are yet to be received at our end,” he said. Adding that the office will take 15 days maximum to process the salaries once all the relevant documents come in, the CEO said, “The school management is supposed to send us all the papers.”
The Corporate Manager for both these schools, Reverend Muthusamy Christhudhas, told TNM that all the formalities from the diocese's side have been completed and that the papers are yet to move in the DEO's office.
The Kuzhithurai DEO did not respond to calls from TNM.