Chennai: The School Education Department has moved to suspend more than 600 teachers on strike in addition to the more than 400 teachers already suspended.
According to reports, School Education Department secretary Rameswara Murugan today passed the orders to suspend 602 teachers who had been arrested yesterday.
The department has already suspended 450 teachers and has decided to announce their posts as vacant. It would recruit temporary teachers to fill the posts, said the reports.
In the meantime, it is said teachers have been returning to work in many schools as the deadline for their joining duty was running out.
Chennai principal education officer Thiruvalarchelvi, speaking to mediapersons at Egmore today, said the appointment of the new teachers would be purely temporary. She said 99.9 per cent teachers in Chennai had returned to work and schools were functioning normally.
The official said show-cause notices had been issued to four teachers who did not show up for work in Chennai.
Tamilnadu government staff and teachers, under the banner JACTO-GEO, have been on strike since 22 January, pressing their 9-point charter of demands. One of the main demands of the group is to revert back to the old pension scheme.