House rent, medical allowance hiked

After 28 long years, the government yesterday increased the house rent allowance for the teachers and employees of non-government education institutions who enjoy Monthly Pay Order (MPO) facilities.
The medical allowance for them has also been raised.
The new house rent allowance has been revised to Tk 500 from Tk 100, and the medical allowance doubled to Tk 300 from Tk 150, announced Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid yesterday at a press conference at his ministry's conference room.
He said as many as 456,590 teachers and employees of 26,047 non-government schools, colleges and madrasas under the Directorate of Secondary and Higher Education (DSHE) and 13,254 teachers and employees of 1,600 institutions under the Directorate of Technical Education would enjoy the new hike.
Although the medical allowance was increased to Tk 150 in two phases from Tk 60, the house rent had seen no increase in last 28 years.
Teachers and staff at government schools get at least Tk 4,000 as house rent allowance and Tk 450 as medical allowance, according to the current salary structure.
Terming the hike historic, the education minister said no previous governments had given such facilities to the teachers of MPO-listed institutions.
He expected the teachers and employees would be happy with the hike, although he admitted that it's quite tough to rent a house at Tk 500 now.

The salary and allowances the teachers had been receiving were not enough to run their families, said Nahid, adding, "We are not saying we have solved all of their problems. This will at least help things a bit and I hope they will be happy."
The government decision, however, did not make the teachers happy.
"We are not at all satisfied with the hike as it is not up to our expectations," Mohammad Azizul Islam, president of Bangladesh Shikkhak Samity, told The Daily Star.
"Is it possible to rent a house in the slum with this amount?" asked Azizul, also a convener of National Front of Teachers and Employees (NFTE).
Principal Shahjahan Alam Shaju, one of the conveners of Shikkhak Karmachari Oikya Parishad, said, "We don't think the hike is honourable as we have been pressing for equal facilities in line with the government pay structure."
The education minister also announced that the allowances for teachers at individual ebtedai madrasas have been doubled to Tk 1,000 from previous Tk 500. As many as 6,076 teachers of 1,519 madrasas will enjoy the facility.
Nahid said the increased allowances would be effective from January 1 this year.
The post of assistant librarian has been included in the MPO list for the first time, he said. The government will have to bear an additional expenditure of Tk 244 crore to pay the increased allowances, he added.