Bihar to recruit over 1.78 lakh school teachers, cabinet clears proposal

NEW DELHI: Bihar cabinet on Tuesday approved the proposal of appointment of over 1.78 lakh teachers through the Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) under the new recruitment rules. In a meeting held today in Patna, the cabinet chaired by Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar has approved the recruitment of 1,78,026 to fill vacant teaching posts in the state.

This comes a week after the government's high-powered committee on April 24 finalised the pay scale for a new section of teachers who will be appointed through a centralised exam conducted by BPSC. Under the new policy - the Bihar State School Teachers (Appointment, Transfer, Disciplinary Action and Service Condition) Rules, 2023 – Bihar is planning to hold a second exam for TET (or Bihar STET) qualified candidates as part of teaching recruitment drives.

Bihar Teachers Recruitment : Classes 1 to 12

The Bihar cabinet on April 10 approved the new service conditions manual for government school teachers. To implement the new rules for teachers recruitment, Bihar education department had on April 17 asked all district education officers (DEOs) to submit vacancy data by April 20.

Number of teachers who will be recruited across different levels is given below.

Bihar Teachers Vacancy 2023

The recruitment process under the new rules will start soon, said Bihar deputy chief minister Tejashwi Yadav in a tweet after the cabinet meeting on Tuesday.

The newly-recruited teachers will have status equivalent to state government employees, be organised into district cadres but state-level authorities will manage the cadres, not the Panchayat-level institutions.

Also Read | What are Bihar’s new teacher recruitment rules and why have they led to protests?

Bihar teachers salary

Bihar government’s high-powered committee on April 24 in a meeting finalised the pay scale for the new lot of 1.78 lakh teachers who will be appointed under the new teacher recruitment rules 2023.

Niyojit Shikshak salary

In Bihar, there are permanent teachers who were appointed to regular positions before 2003. From 2003 panchayati raj institutions (PRIs) recruited contract teachers called shiksha mitra for 33 months. The vast majority of them had completed just Class 10 and were not TET-qualified. From 2006, this group became known as niyojit shikshak and were allowed to continue at a higher pay and better benefits.

Now, niyojit shikshak will also have to write the recruitment exam to get salary and perks under new structure as per the new rules which aims at reforming and standardising the recruitment process. They are against writing another exam conducted by BPSC along with fresh candidates for getting state employee status.

Also Read | Over 9.8 lakh teacher vacancies in government schools across India

Even though there have been protests by teachers orgnisations, Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar has stated categorically no change will be made.

“All the members of seven parties who are part of the government have decided together that we will recruit teachers under new rules. We will appoint more than two lakh teachers this year. We will allow the in-service teachers to continue their jobs and increase their salaries too,” he said in his address during a function to commemorate Ambedkar Jayanti at his party office in Patna.

Bihar Niyojit Shikshak Salary

According to data from the latest Unified District Information System for Education Plus (UDISE+) 2021-22, there are 93,165 schools in Bihar.