DW BUREAU / Chandigarh Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann on Friday said a notification relating to regularisation of the services of nearly 9,000 contractual teachers has been issued. He met a delegation representing the 8,736 teachers whose services will now be regularised. The five-member delegation thanked Mann for accepting their long-pending demand of regularisation of the service, according to an official release. CM Mann handed over the notification of regularising the services to the delegation of teachers. Mann said these teachers have been working for long on contractual posts only, adding that some of these teachers have been discharging their duties for the last 14 years. Mann said for a bright future of students, the livelihood of teachers must be secured. Keeping in view this fact only, his government decided to regularise services of these teachers, said Mann. The Punjab Cabinet had last month given a nod to a policy framed for regularising the services of contractual, ad hoc, daily wage and temporary teachers who have completed 10 years of service. It decided to regularise the services of around 9,000 teachers by placing them in a special cadre. According to the policy, the beneficiary employees will continue in service till 58 years of age. Meanwhile, Education Minister Harjot Singh Bains said the AAP had promised to regularise the jobs of contractual employees within six months of formation of the government, but the Mann government fulfilled its promise in five-and-a-half months. He said a 'policy for welfare of ad hoc, contractual, temporary teachers (nation builder) and other employees in the school education department' has been notified. "Our party leaders, including Bhagwant Singh Mann and national convener Arvind Kejriwal, had participated in several 'dharnas' to resolve demands of these temporary teachers before the Punjab Assembly elections. We had given them a guarantee that these teachers would be regularised on priority basis and I am elated to announce that today, we have fulfilled our another guarantee," he said. He took on the previous governments over this issue, accusing them of just making announcements for regularising the services of contractual and temporary employees "but nothing happened on the ground". (editor@dailyworld.in)