PESHAWAR: Government Schools Teachers Association (GSTA) on Friday demanded of the Minister for Education Atif Khan to issue directives for filling 1000 vacant positions of subject specialist (SS) and 600 of headmasters in different government schools of Khyber Pukhtunkhwa (KP). In a meeting held at Shaheed Saqib Ghani higher secondary school Cantonment-II here on Friday GSTA members, including its president Sardar Amanullah, demanded provincial minister for education Atif Kha and department of elementary and secondary education for the filling up the hundreds vacant positions in KP schools in upcoming budget of 2016-17. He said, absence of SS teaching staff in different higher secondary schools of KP have largely affected the study of the students in the educational institutions. He said that summer vacation is good opportunity with education department and education minister KP Atif Khan to carry out the procedure of teaching staff hiring at government schools and made available the teaching staff with-in three month duration. Sardar Amanullah, said that Government of KP has never been pragmatic to fulfill its promises to plug the loop holes in the education sector, adding that time and again PTI led government in the province deviated from its promise which might have bad impact on its performance in education sector particularly. President GSTA said that the Chief Minister Parvaz Khattak and Atif Khan Education Minister will face criticism if they did not sanction posts in coming budget. “Teachers in government schools of KP also waiting for compensatory allowance that all grade 16 teachers who were not promoted to grade 17 would be given special compensatory allowances as per the CM promised with GSTA in previous budget” he added. He resolved, that GSTA will show its support to teachers and students and will always raise for the rightful demands of the teachers community on every forum of the province. Sahibzada Hamid Mehmood, additional director at Secondary and Elementary Education Department of KP informed, Daily Time that steps have been initiated to bridge the gape of teaching staff at KP government schools and first initiative in this regard has been taken from the primary schools of the province. Adding that after meeting the requirements of primary schools teaching staff the appointment for higher and higher secondary schools will be carried out systematically. However, one of the officials of the education department said request of the anonymity that KP education department has no plan and intention in the budget of 2016-17 to fill such large scale of gap of teaching staff at government schools. It is pertinent to mention here that KP government is facing daunting challenges in education sector but most important among them is to abridge the gap of teaching staff at government schools.