Poll personnel deaths



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The Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee demanded compensation and other help to shiksha mitras, instructors, cooks and teachers who died during panchayat election duties in recent weeks.
“The government should not discriminate between teachers and shiksha mitras, instructors, cook etc who died while discharging their duties in the recent panchayat elections and provide them the same compensation and other helps which are sanctioned for all government staff who succumbed on duty,” UP Congress chief Ajay Kumar Lallu said in Lucknow on Monday.
Lallu pointed out that besides over 700 teachers, 200 shiksha mitras, 99 instructors and 100 cooks also succumbed to Covid during panchayat elections across the state. He said that while the government announced a compensation of Rs 30 lakh for the kin of the deceased teachers, no such announcement was made for shiksha mitras and others.
Earlier, Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra had expressed concern over the deaths of teachers on panchayat poll duties in Uttar Pradesh and demanded a compensation of Rs 50 lakh for their kin.
The UP Prathmik Shikshak Sangh had also demanded a compensation of Rs 1 crore to the kin of the staff and teachers who died during poll duty. “The number of teachers and staff who died of COVID-19 after being assigned duty in Panchayat polls and Covid control rooms has gone up to 1,621. Despite assurances mad on May 1 by the chief secretary that unwell teachers and staff would not be asked to be on poll duties, those absent due to illness on counting and voting days were suspended without being given a chance to explain and they also had to face salary cuts,” a UP Primary Teachers Association office-bearer in Lucknow revealed on Sunday.
Uttar Pradesh Prathmik Shikshak Sangh chief Dinesh Chandra Sharma said that the number of Primary Education department teachers and staff who died on or after poll duties due to the viral infection has gone up  to 1,621.
“Moreover, many teachers and staff with heart diseases died due to tension and heart attack. In fact, COVID-19 safety protocols were not followed at the counting centres. The Basic Education department teachers and staff are allowed to work from home but in several districts like Unnao, Rae Bareli, Lucknow, Basti, Banda and Hardoi, they were assigned duties at the Covid control rooms. What is more worrying is that even after so much loss of lives, officials in districts are harassing primary teachers,” Sharma alleged.
The Sangh demanded that a compensation of Rs 1 crore be provided to the kin of the deceased staff and teachers and all punitive action against the teachers and staff absent on polling duty be immediately withdrawn and all the staff and teachers who were part of the poll duty be declared as corona warriors.
On May 11, the Allahabad High Court had said that the compensation provided to kin of polling officers who died on duty during panchayat polls due to the “deliberate act on part of the State and State Election Commission to force them to perform duties in the absence of RT-PCR support” should be at least Rs 1 crore. The UP government had recently told the court that it would provide a compensation of Rs 30 lakh to family members of the deceased polling officers, including teachers and shiksha mitras.
“It is not a case that somebody volunteered to render his/her services during election but it was all made obligatory to those assigned with election duty to perform their duties during election even while they showed their reluctance. The amount of the compensation, in our considered opinion, is very less,” a Division Bench of Justices Siddhartha Varma and Ajit Kumar said in their observation on May 11.