AGARTALA, June 24 (TIWN): Another 10323 teacher, Pradip Debnath (50) of East Gokul Nagar died while undergoing treatment at a private hospital in Kolkata taking the death toll to 104. Conveying their colleagues’ death, the 10323 teacher said, “After losing job, most of the teachers died due to lack of treatment. Several committed suicides over debt. Few of them started selling tea, vegetables on the streets to survive. And now amid the curfew imposed due to the pandemic, we are in a severe crisis. Some of our colleagues are unable to buy milk for their children or medicines for their old parents and the responsibility has to be taken by the State Govt only. It must take initiative to recruit us as promised by the ruling government during the 2018 Assembly election.”

“We want to awake the Govt. and make it clear that we have not stopped our protest. It’s better to die on road than on dying due to hunger and poverty” he added.

Meanwhile, the JMC announced to protest on 27th June. After a meeting was held on Wednesday among the Joint Movement Committee (JMC) members, the 10323 teachers announced the protest program. Talking to the media after the meeting JMC member Bijoy Krishna Saha said, "We have lost our 103 colleagues but so far there is no role of the State Govt to fix the crisis which has hit the 10323 teachers' families. So, we have decided that on next 27th June, we will gather to stage a protest. We have not decided the place, where we will protest but we will be on road with our demands. We request the Tripura Govt to take action to save our lives as per your pre-election (2018 Assembly Election) promise given to us. You promised us to solve our problems as per law and so we demand that you keep your words". 

The decision was taken after conducting a meeting at City Centre, Agartala, and in the meeting everyone supported to protest on June 27th.