Lockdown reduces teacher, an MPhil, and his wife, an MBA, into labourers

Lockdown reduces teacher, an MPhil, and his wife, an MBA, into labourers

Nirupa.Vatyam@timesgroup.com

Hyderabad:  19.05.2020

After being a high school teacher in private institutions for 12 years, Chiranjeevi K is working as a labourer on drought-related government works in Yadadri-Bhuvanagiri district. With the lockdown in place and schools not paying salaries, this is the only way he can feed his family of six.

Chiranjeevi, who holds three degrees — MA in social work, an MPhil in rural development and a BEd — and his wife Padma, an MBA and private teacher, have been toiling under the blazing sun as daily-wage workers for the past week. The family’s collective monthly income was Rs 60,000 before the lockdown. Today, it is down to zero.

Chiranjeevi is not alone. Many teachers who had been working in schools, junior colleges, degree, and professional colleges before the lockdown in both Telangana and Andhra Pradesh have been forced to work as dailywage workers. Most teachers hold postgraduate degrees and have been in the profession for at least half a decade.

“Until now, we have seen farmer suicides. At this rate, teachers will be next,” says Chiranjeevi. “None of us received our April salaries. We fear we won’t get a steady income till October.” “I have two daughters, both in kindergarten, and elderly parents. Despite having a white ration card, we are not given rations or the Rs 1,500 relief promised by the state,” he said.

Many of the teachers TOI spoke to said that life was not easy even as labourers as there is high demand for drought-related work. There are just too many educated people, apart from teachers, competing for these jobs since the lockdown. They said it was the government, more than school and college managements, that had failed to support teachers. A few of them have also taken to vending fruits and vegetables but are too embarrassed to reveal the sudden change in profession.

“Almost all teachers in the Telugu states are in the same position. Some of them call teacher unions daily and request them to talk to managements or government officials for their salaries,” said P Mani, an English lecturer in a junior college in Andhra Pradesh’s Chittoor district who is currently working for a daily wage of Rs 250 cleaning up lakes.

Hundreds of teachers have been hit. P Mani, lecturer in English at a junior college, now earns Rs 250 daily as a labourer by cleaning up lakes