Several teachers’ organisations from Delhi University will be holding a Candlelight Vigil, today, Thursday, September 21, near the Vivekananda Statue at the university’s arts faculty at 6 pm. The reason is the alleged displacement of several ad-hoc teachers who were serving for decades in Satyawati College (Evening).

Displacement of ad-hoc teachers has been a constant concern for the Delhi University teachers’ associations. The faculty members have alleged that more than 70 per cent of the ad-hoc faculty has been displaced, including those who have been teaching for over two decades.

The teachers shared examples of ad-hoc teachers from Satyawati College (Evening), some of them from marginalised communities, who had been working for decades and were recently displaced by the university during a selection process in September.

“A Visually Impaired (VI) candidate who had taught for nine years has been displaced. What can be more criminal than this? Another example is of a person from the Scheduled Tribe (ST) category  who had been serving for 14 years. He must have inspired so many people. This is against social justice and extremely unfortunate. It is an entire generation of people who came from marginalised communities, faced hardships more than other people and inspired people from their communities,” said Abha Dev Habib, Secretary, Democratic Teachers’ Front (DTF) and former Executive Council member of Delhi University.

The joint call for the candlelight vigil has been made by the Democratic United Teachers Alliance, a collective of 10 organisations and several individual teachers formed ahead of Delhi University Teachers’ Association (DUTA) elections. The alliance includes DTF, Academic for Action and Development Delhi Teachers' Association (AADTA), Common Teachers Forum (CTF), Delhi Teachers’ Initiative (DTI), and others.

There have been allegations of an en-masse displacement of ad-hoc faculty members taking place during the current teacher recruitment drive at the varsity.