The Jammu and Kashmir Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha has taken a serious note of a Kashmiri youth’s suicide in the valley’s Kulgam district and ordered immediate release of the salaries of over 600 schoolteachers who had not been paid any wages for their work in the last 26 months which includes 15 months of the coronavirus pandemic.

Twenty-three-year-old Shoaib Mir of Avil, in Damhal Hanjipora area of Kulgam district in southern Kashmir had ended his life under tremendous stress over non-payment of salary to his father Bashir Ahmad Mir, a teacher at the local Primary School, on 28 May. Before consuming poison, which subsequently led to his death at a hospital in Srinagar, Shoaib had recorded a two-minute video on his smartphone, narrating how officers of the J&K School Education Department made his family’s life miserable by declining to release his father’s salary for two-and-a-half years.

“The only purpose of my committing suicide is to lay the sacrifice of life so that it solves the problem of all those teachers who have not been paid their salaries in the last two-and-a-half years. My family has been suffering untold miseries as my father has not been paid any wages for his work in the last two-and-a-half years. My family has suffered immensely and they should survive the trauma of my death”, Shoaib said in his recorded suicide statement which went viral in the social media after his death.

Shoaib’s extreme step in distress sent shockwaves across Jammu and Kashmir. It invoked bitter criticism from the civil society which in one voice demanded release of all such government employees’ salaries and action against the officers responsible for the Kulgam youth’s abetment to suicide. By coincidence it all happened around the replacement of the Chief Secretary BVR Subrahmanyam. Those who issued statements through tweets included the former Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti.

Highly placed bureaucratic sources revealed that LG Manoj Sinha took a serious notice of the Kashmiri youth’s suicide due to the circumstances apparently created by some officers in the government. After a discussion with Sinha, new Chief Secretary Dr Arun Kumar Mehta, who is also holding charge as Financial Commissioner Finance, directed Principal Secretary Education BK Singh to ensure disbursement of all the teachers’ salaries “within 24 hours”.

On Wednesday, 2 June, Director School Education (DSE) Kashmir, Tassaduq Hussain Mir, released an amount of Rs 33 crore to Chief Education Officers (CEOs) in all the ten Kashmir division districts and directed them to ensure that the Drawing and Disbursing Officers (DDOs) transfer salaries of the last 26 months of the aggrieved teachers to their bank accounts ‘immediately’. The orders were accordingly implemented on Wednesday and Thursday.

Deputy Commissioner of Kulgam Dr Bilal Mohiuddin said: “I visited the traumatised family and found them hugely distressed. I came to know that the family had also picked up the bank loan of Rs 3-4 lakhs. Since the Department of School Education Kashmir had Rs 45 crore available since long for this purpose, there was prima facie no justification for withholding the salary of any government employee. Now the department at the highest level is inquiring into the circumstances that led to the ill-fated youth’s death reportedly by consuming poison”.

Shoiab was pursuing a Masters through IGNOU after a Bachelor of Technology from Punjab.

DC Kulgam said that there was reportedly an issue of some teachers’ character verification from the CID. “But there should have been a decision. We can’t put someone on the job of teaching for over two years and refuse to release his salary. If there’s a substantial adversity that doesn’t permit employment in the government, it could have been withdrawn under a lawful procedure”, he asserted.

In the social media, most of the people are holding the former DSE Kashmir, Yunus Malik, responsible for “creating the circumstances of suicide for hundreds of teachers”.

While Malik could not be reached for his comments, the incumbent DSE Kashmir, Tassaduq Hussain Mir, claimed that Malik had written to the Commissioner-Secretary Education who in turn took up this issue with the General Administration Department, headed by the former Chief Secretary. “But, unfortunately no decision was taken for over two years with regard to 603 teachers whose character verification had not been cleared by the CID in unambiguous terms”, Mir asserted.

According to the senior government officials, around 36,000 people had been recruited through the erstwhile Rehbar-e-Taleem (RET) from time in 1998-2018 period. Many of them were regularised as teachers after putting in five years of continuous service against curtailed wages. However, a crisis crept in when the Central government’s Sarva Shikhsha Abhiyan (SSA) was amalgamated into the new SAMAGRA scheme. As the J&K had neither funds nor vacancies, the Governor’s administration in the year 2018 created supernumerary vacancies for regularisation of the RETs of SSA.

“In Kashmir, we had around 4,000 vacancies available. Since the number of the RETs was over 21,000 in Kashmir alone, the government created a total of 17,236 vacancies to accommodate all the RETs. All of them were regularised. However, regularisation of 603 inductees remained pending for want of unambiguous character verification in their favour by the CID and other agencies. Academic testimonials of 9 incumbents proved fake. Verification of degrees and documents is still pending for over 500 of them”, said DSE Kashmir Tassaduq Mir.

Mir revealed that Shoiab’s father Bashir Ahmad Mir could not get “unambiguous character verification” from CID. “In all other cases, CID reports that there’s nothing adverse. In 59 cases, including that of Bashir Ahmad Mir, CID reported that long back they had acted as militants but since last many years, they had no adverse involvement.

DSEK was not clear whether such recruits have to be terminated or retained. The interpretation from the government is still awaited”, Mir said.

However, the standing instructions to DSEK after the Kulgam youth’s suicide are that everybody who has worked must be paid immediately and if anybody’s verification comes adverse and does not permit his or her regularisation into the government service, the salaries paid to him/her could be recovered. As of now, all the 603 teachers, including Bashir Ahmad Mir have been paid full amount of the salaries withheld for 26 months.