The DMK government’s plans to erect a pen statue for the late DMK patriarch M Karunanidhi has drawn criticism from all quarters, even while the DMK government has delayed the payment of salary to government-aided school teachers in many districts, leaving many wondering where the money for the statue will come from when they don’t have money to pay salaries.
According to reports, the salaries of many Tamil Nadu government-aided school teachers in many districts have not been credited to their bank accounts for three days since the start of the month.
Many government-aided schools operate in the same manner as government schools throughout Tamil Nadu. The monthly salary is usually credited to each teacher’s bank account on the last day of the month.
However, government-aided school teachers in many districts have been affected as their salaries have not been credited to their bank accounts for three days since the start of this month. Protests have also been announced in some districts.
A government-aided teacher said,”Every month, the principals will post the salary list for the teachers on the Finance Department’s IFHRMS website. From the 16th to the 28th, they will upload it. However, the salary list of government-aided school teachers could not be uploaded after January 16. The Finance Department’s website refused to accept it. We immediately informed the education authorities about this. We have been insisting on this since the day this problem arose. They took no action. It is not known if there is a problem with the digital platform or if the government has not allocated funds.”
The teacher added,”Only the monthly salary we can cover the family’s expenses; in particular, the EMI for each bank loan taken. If the installments are not paid by the due date, penalties will be levied. Apart from that, every teacher has many problems including medical expenses. We have not received our salary this month, and we are very disappointed.”
It is noteworthy to mention what Tamil Nadu Finance Minister PTR Palanivel Thiagarajan who is also the Minister for Human Resources Development, had said on 2 February 2023 while speaking at an event on political strategy.
Answering a question whether it is fulfilling to be an economic expert or an MLA or a Minister, Palanivel Thiagarajan noted that while as MLA he was able to be transparent and communicate to the people about the work done, there are some constraints as a Minister.
“It is harder to measure the work done by an Opposition MLA. But at the same time, I was named in Junior Vikatan as a best performing MLA and in some awards ceremony I was honoured as one of the top 10 MLAs. Six months once, I went door-to-door, explaining the details about what I did and did not – how many schemes I fulfilled, where all the constituency development funds were spent, how many complaints were received and addressed. I was happy that I was able to bring in that kind of professionalism and transparency as an MLA. But today I have responsibilities as a Minister.”, he said.
Palanivel Thiagarajan further said “I have the exact opposite problem of being an MLA. Because, the results are coming out excellent. Far better than what I expected, with the support of my Chief Minister, we are able to bring reforms and bring out excellent outcomes. The only problem is…whatever we do, we take 100-200 initiatives, that is why the results are coming, nothing falls from the sky, nothing in life comes free like that. However, we’re not able to openly tell which initiatives, reforms, G.O, new systems, new restrictions, are bringing these outcomes. We’re not able to tell because we can achieve it only if we do it like inserting a pin inside a banana. If we tell openly, we will face a lot of opposition. We will face a volley of questions like ‘why is this happening?, these things should not be done,’ despite doing it democratically and the results showing up. Since we don’t want to create enemies unnecessarily, we’re underplaying it and going by the model of ‘let the results speak for themselves’.”
In this situation where teachers of government-aided schools are yet to get their salaries, the DMK government has announced plans to erect a pen statue for former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Karunanidhi inside the sea. This has sparked public outrage, particularly given the Tamil Nadu government’s inability to pay the salaries of government-aided school teachers.
Social media users have also circulated information from the ‘White Paper on Finance of Tamil Nadu’ released by Tamil Nadu Finance Minister Palanivel Thiagarajan, who stated that every household in Tamil Nadu has a debt burden of ₹2,63,976. They questioned whether the pen statue was necessary given the state’s poor financial situation.
அப்படி இருக்கப்போ எதுக்கு அந்த பேனா சிலை ? @ptrmadurai pic.twitter.com/1wqY5rR6qZ
— Savukku Shankar (@Veera284) February 2, 2023
(With inputs from Vikatan)
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