Retired teachers with fudged designations nailed
Source: The Sangai Express
Imphal, February 11 2009:
With the Assembly instituting a House Committee to probe the report that a number of teachers at the time of retirement had fudged their designations as Head Master-in-charge and hence drew a larger arrear and pension, the Government has been able to recover Rs 74 crores from the frauds till date.
Following an expose' published by The Sangai Express some years back, the report had rocked the Assembly prompting it to constitute a House Committee to probe the matter further and number of employees in the Education (S) Department were suspended from service for their complicity in the case.
Following a report from the Accountant General that a huge amount of money has been withdrawn by retired teachers, the Vigilance Department had also taken up a case.
The money was withdrawn without the concurrence of the Finance Department by the retired teachers by fudging their designations as pensions and arrears on a much higher pay scale.
The Rs 74 crore has been recovered from the frauds after the AG furnished their names to the Finance Department and suggested deductions from their pensions monthly.
A reliable source said that the pension of a number of retired employees of the Education Department has been put hold following detection of certain discrepancies.
Significantly the number of pensioners of the State Government is 34,497 while the number of employees set for retirement in 2008-09 is 1794, 1838 in 2009-10, 1812 in 2010-11, 2116 in 2011-12 and 2268 in 2012-13 .
On the other hand it has come to light that the Government has no fund to pay the salaries of teachers for the month of January and February as the same has been paid to adhoc employees of the Education Department posted in the valley areas.
Interestingly all the adhoc employees have been terminated from service.
Till date the Government has released salaries for 50 pc of the adhoc employees in the hills while 25 pc have been released in the valley areas.
There is still fund to release the salaries of teachers posted in the hills, while there is none for the teachers in the valley areas.
To make up for the fund deficit in the valley areas, the Finance Department has submitted a revised estimate.