Karnataka govt announces doubling salary of guest lecturers in colleges

Bengaluru: The Karnataka government on Friday announced doubling the salary of guest lecturers in state-run colleges.

The decision was taken on the basis of a report submitted by the government-constituted three-member committee, and it will benefit thousands of guest lecturers working in government first-grade colleges.

Praising Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai for personally taking interest in addressing the demands of guest lecturers, Higher Education Minister C N Ashwath Narayanan said four types of classifications have been formulated to fix the salaries.

Earlier, the guest lecturers were paid a salary of Rs 13,000 per month for those with UGC-prescribed eligibility and Rs 11,000 per month for those who did not meet it. Now, the salaries have been increased to a minimum of Rs 26,000 per month and a maximum of Rs 32,000 per month.

It has been decided to pay the salaries before the 10th of every month, and to appoint them on an academic year basis (10 months duration) instead of a semester basis as had prevailed earlier.

”As UGC-prescribed eligibility conditions will be made mandatory for recruiting guest faculty in the coming years, a three-year time has been set for guest lecturers to clear the required tests/examinations,” Narayanan said.

It has been also decided to give weightage to seniority of service while appointing the guest lecturers. To ensure this, a selection list will be prepared based on the existing parameters of the department, it was stated.