Minister’s thumbs down to anti-salwar brigade

Mou Chakraborty
Kolkata, August 27, 2007
THE OFFICIAL line on the sari-salwar tussle is out. School education minister Partha De has told Bakrahat Girls’ High School management committee members: “Let the teachers wear what they want to”.
The minister’s observation comes after the managing committee members of the school had objected to teachers wearing salwar-kameez.
Eight schoolteachers had reported for duty in salwar-kameez on August 21. This “break from tradition” had enraged the school’s managing committee, guardians, locals as well as students. In fact, policemen had to rescue the teachers, who were locked up in a room and hurled abuses.
The unseeming row made headlines and the minister had to intervene. After meeting the teachers soon after the incident, De held talks with the managing committee members to put across his stand on the issue
Present at Monday’s meeting were managing committee president Tapan Samanta, secretary Anup Ghosh, headmistress Saswati Das, guardian and teachers’ representatives and a police officer from the local police station.
Emerging from the meeting, De said: “ We have discussed the issue. Salwar is OK and I have asked them not to object to it. The teachers can wear anything they want as long as it is not obscene.”
The eight teachers, who had been advised by the minister to skip school after the incident took place, will return to take classes from August 30 in outfits of their choice.
The managing committee members, however, told De that wearing salwar-kameez was not the issue and they had problem with the behaviour and teaching technique of the teachers. There were several complaints against them, they said. “We have not stopped them from wearing salwar. The teachers had raked up the dress row to avoid charges brought against them,” said a member of the delegation on condition of anonymity.
De, however, refused to buy their argument and asked the managing committee to convene an academic council meeting to resolve the problem.
The teachers also refuted charges levelled against them. “All eight of us have very good academic background. Some of us have been teaching here for eight years. There is no complaint with our teaching technique or behaviour. The entire row is over dress code,” a teacher told HT on condition of anonymity.
She added: “At secretary Anup Ghosh’s Future Gems School teachers are permitted to wear salwar, but it was opposed when we wanted to.”
The minister also hauled up the managing committee for involving locals and students in the dispute.
Mou.Chakraborty@hindustantimes.com