85 assistant professors, lecturers to be deployed at quarantine centers

Bisma Bhat

Srinagar, Mar 25: Facing an acute dearth of manpower in combating the spread of novel coronavirus, Jammu and Kashmir government has appointed 85 lecturers and assistant professors as nodal officers for different quarantine centers in the Srinagar city.

An official at the DC office said that the government has been on high alert as there are chances that the number of positive cases can go up in the coming days.

“Government needs more manpower to tackle the situation in the coming days. In quarantines centers, there are already people, but the government has to relieve them and that is why the higher education department has been involved now,” the official said.

On March 25, Deputy Commissioner, Srinagar, issued an order deputing 85 lecturers and assistant professors for emergency duties.  “Keeping in view the situation arising out of COVID 19 pandemic, 85 officials of the higher secondary department are hereby deployed with the Deputy Commissioner Office Srinagar till further orders,” reads the order.

Among the 85 faculty members, 47 are assistant professors from various degree colleges and 38 are lecturers, masters, and teachers from the different higher secondary schools.

 “We were called to the DC office today and instructed to take the charge as nodal officers of various quarantine centers,” said one of the lecturers, who is in the list.

He, however, said that teachers are not fit for this job. “We are not trained for dealing with such cases,” he said.

Another assistant professor said each faculty member is assigned to a particular quarantine center for two to three days. “Aren’t government putting our families at high risk?” he asked.

Principal SP College, Dr Khurshid Ahmad said he has received an order in which seven faculty members from his college were instructed to report to DC office Srinagar. “They have been assigned duties with respect to COVID 19,” he said.

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