ISLAMABAD: Among the protestors, 40-year-old Sidra Zahra stands in front of the National Press Club for her legal right. Sidra Zahra has been a teacher for the last 10 years in a government school, and now her family life is suffering owing to lack of timely salaries, due to which she is not being able to meet her financial requirements. Zahra has been protesting for the last 103 days along with her counterparts but the departments concerned have not paid heed to her. “I have two children; my husband is a low paid wager while I come daily from Kak Pul by local transport over here. My daily traveling is another agony for me,” Zahra told Daily Times. Zahra is one of hundreds of daily wage employees of the Federal Directorate of Education (FDE) who have been protesting outside the NPC not for any political motives but to seek their own constitutional rights as they have not been paid since June last year. The FDE has 423 educational institutions including 20 model colleges across the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) while, as per available information, currently, there are around 1,700 daily wagers working in these institutions. The issue of these employees have lingered since 2009. Sources said in the beginning that there were around 2,250 daily wagers, adding that some over 500 employees quit their jobs after they were exhausted by discriminatory approach of the authorities concerned. Zahra says she is not only one who has economic odds but several others are passing through the same circumstances, many among them are single parents who have no other option but to commit suicide as they are now tired from protesting or going on strike. Another female teacher Quratulain works at the Islamabad College for Girls, Sector F-6/2 and informed this correspondent that she resides in a rented home located in Gulzar-e-Quaid Colony near Benazir Bhutto International Airport. “I have been working since eight years and have not have been paid my salary for the last one year. The authorities concerned don’t bother the difficulties I am was facing due to this issue,” she regretted adding that from day one the government did not devise any kind of strategy in this regard instead, she alleged, only committees were constituted to silence the protesters. “The authorities should think about how difficult it is for a single parent to feed her children and run the home in this age of inflation,” she regretted. Another teacher Sana Yousafzai who is also a single parent, with three children, serving in Islamabad Model College for Girls, F-10 for the past six years, says all domestic responsibilities are on her shoulders the dearth of salary is a major cause for concern. “The government pays us Rs 1,400 per month which equals to Rs 350 per day which was also withheld since many months and it puts my domestic life in big trouble,” Sana Yousafzai said. She has a double Master’s degree with a Bachelors in Education. Single mother Ayesha Batool teaches at IMCG I-8/4 and says that she comes out to protest every day with her child. “Every new morning motivates me to prepare for another presence in protest with the hope that authorities might take pity on our plight but so far each day ends with the same appointment,” she said. Another teacher, Batool, added that besides financial crisis, the overwhelming issue is an emotional torture as well. “We have tried each and every way but all in vain. Now we are unable to understand what to do and where to find relief,” she said helplessly. While recalling the past, another mother of two children, Aafia, who also teaches at IMCG F-8/1 said that the previous minster Barrister Usman Ibrahim also made no strategy to resolve the issue in real means. “The job status of around 300 teachers among us have been notified as permanent in the past and their medical also has been done but the ministry and FDE is lingering on the matter intentionally just to protect their own interests,” she alleged. As per available information, many forums including parliamentary standing committees, Supreme Court and lower courts have given their decisions in favour of these employees. In 2009, a committee was formulated by Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly Syed Khurshid Shah for regularisation of contractual employees. In light of that direction, over 1 million government contractual employees had been regularised in the past. Moreover, the Ministry of Capital Administration & Development Division (CADD), the FDE is its attached body, also regularised thousands of employees in light of Khurshid Shah’s committee’s recommendations at Polyclinic, Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences and other allied departments. Published in Daily Times, April 15th 2018.