Odisha APTI accuses OPCA of financial embezzlement by not paying legitimate salaries to teachers

Bhubaneswar, March 8, 2023 :

The national vice-president of the Association of Pharmacy Teachers of India (APTI) has accused the Odisha Pharmacy Colleges Association (OPCA) of ‘financial embezzlement’ by not paying the legitimate salaries to teachers despite sufficient students being admitted to each course in every institution.

He alleged that the college managements are uploading fake information about teachers with qualifications and UGC approved pay bands on the PCI website to convince the national pharmacy education regulator, PCI, that they are complying with the PCI rules, but in reality the institutions are cheating the faculty members.
 
Except a few institutions, all other pharmacy colleges in Odisha are not maintaining the cadre structure of faculty members and not disbursing proper salaries as prescribed by the University Grants Commission (UGC) and the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), the vice-president of the APTI said.
 
Talking to Pharmabiz, he said the institution managements are really violating the norms of the UGC and of the PCI in the case of cadre creation of the teaching faculties. On the website of the PCI, the institutions give information as per PCI norms about teaching faculties, their qualifications and salary scale. But most of the colleges lack qualified and experienced teachers as per the norms of the PCI or the UGC or the AICTE.
 
Prof. Dr. Mihir Kumar Kar, the national vice-president of the APTI, says that as per the revised pay structure for different categories of teachers in all technical institutions, a person entering the teaching profession should be designated as Assistant Professor and he/she should be placed in a pay band of Rs. 15,600-Rs. 39,100 with Academic Grade Pay (AGP) of Rs. 6,000.
 
The pay band for Associate Professor is Rs. 37,400- Rs. 67,000 with an AGP of Rs. 9,000. For the post of Professor, the pay scale is Rs. 37,400- Rs. 67,000 with an AGP of Rs.10,000.
 
Raising a major anomaly on the part of the PCI, Dr. Mihir said the Pharmacy Council of India conducts inspections in every college every year and grants approvals for various courses. But the council is not monitoring the way the institutions are working by checking whether they are paying the prescribed salaries to the teachers or not. He said it is the duty of the PCI as the national regulator to instruct the institutions to comply with rules and regulations, otherwise to initiate actions against violations. Despite repeated requests to the national council, the salary problems of the teachers are ignored by the PCI.
 
Pointing out the alleged malpractices of the college managements, the APTI’s eastern India’s leader said corruption, injustice and non-compliance of rules are committed mostly by the institution managements in Odisha when compared to other states. Mainly the salary problems are faced by the experienced professors and associate professors. In most of the colleges, no cadre is maintained. Further, no fresh teacher is coming into the teaching field because of the managements’ exploitation and cheating. 
 
When Pharmabiz contacted Dr. Manoj Kumar Dash, secretary of the Odisha Pharmacy Colleges Association for response, he said he cannot divulge all the matters openly. PharmaBiz