The nine-decade-old Andhra University, which is the biggest public university in Andhra Pradesh and one among the reputed ones in the country, is in the news for the wrong reasons.
It has not been able to pay salaries to its permanent teaching faculty and non-teaching staff and pensions to the retired teachers and non-teaching staff, for the last two months.
This is probably for the first time that such a thing has happened in the university, since its inception in 1926.
Both the former and the current employees of the university are encountering insurmountable hardships for the last two months.
“Almost all of us have EMIs on various types of loans to be paid and the bankers are harassing us for payment. Not only this, many of us are suffering from chronic and critical illness that requires huge payment for medicines and medical care. So far we are somehow managing with our savings, but it will be difficult from now, if the salaries and pensions are not released immediately,” said a former professor.
The teaching staff has not received salaries of December and January and so is the case with former professors and teachers. The non-teaching staff have however received some part amont.
In AU there are around 4,500 to 5,000 former employees comprising both teaching and non-teaching staff. Coming to the serving staff, there are 234 permanent teaching staff and around 1,500 non-teaching staff.
Block grant
Both the salaries and pensions are paid from the block grant that it receives from the State Government. While the salary component is around ₹120 crore per annum, the pension is about ₹265 crore.
The block grant fluctuates and in 2018 it received a grant of ₹300 crore, in 2019 it was scaled down to ₹230 crore, in 2020 it received ₹290 crore and in this year it received ₹400 crore.
Earlier, the block grant was deposited in the account of the university at the treasury, but since 2018, the present government has made some changes. It now pays the salaries and the pension directly to the employees through CFMS accounts.
So practically AU has no role in it and now the ball is in the State Government’s court, said a professor.
Since the block grant takes care of the salary and pension component, which works out to around ₹32 crore per month and around ₹380 crore per annum, the other expenses of running the university, which works out close to ₹150 crore per annum are being met by the university from its funds.
We have been facing a delay in payment for the last six months, but we never expected that it would be for last two months, said a former professor.
