New Delhi: The Jawaharlal Nehru University Teacher's Association (JNUTA), in protest of the service conditions for teachers announced its plan to organize a two-day strike beginning from March 25.

The demand of the teachers included that the post of assistant professors under the Career Advancement Scheme be eligible for the post of associate professor after nine years instead of 12 years as has been proposed in the December 2008 Union Human Resource Development (HRD) Ministry notification.

JNUTA president Prof. B.C. Tripathy while addressing the press conference said that, "The salary of a JNU associate professor is at par with that of an Indian Institute of Technology's (IIT's) assistant professor. We at JNU must slog for 12 years before becoming an associate professor, which is why it becomes difficult to retain talent at JNU. Such a policy will cause the system to stagnate."

"In order to resolve this problem an appointment with the MHRD is sought but none has been given so far," he added.

Over viewing the proposed rules stating that an associate professor can become a professor in three years, Prof. Kamal Mitra Chenoy said that, "A mere three year period will not suffice for an associate to become a professor. It may be easier in the field of sciences but gaining the impact factor and earning points in social sciences and humanities is not an easy task."

He further put forth JNUTA's agenda and protested against the University Grants Commission's (UGC's) guidelines for promotion and assessment of teachers saying, "Decent promotion parameters and a justified pay scale is all that we want. UGC’s proposed rules awards points to teachers based on their amount of research done, national and international conferences attended and papers published which should be changed and focus on quality of teaching."

Expressing dissatisfaction with the pay scales, JNUTA secretary Simi Baidya says that, "A person, even after reaching at the level of an associate professor after toiling hard for 12 years still remains in the pay band 3 instead of 4."

She further added that, "No discrimination should be done between directly recruited and CAS professors. An academic grade pay of Rs.12,000 should be given to all professors after ten years of their service."