The sustained standoff between DAV Shushil Kedia Bishwo Bharati Higher Secondary School and the CPN-Maoist-affiliated All Nepal Teachers’ Organisation (ANTO) has taken a nasty turn.

The agitating ANTO and All Nepal National Independent Students’ Union-Revolutionary on Monday vadalised two buses of the school after the school administration failed to reinstate three teachers who were sacked for their ‘failure to abide by the school norms and standards’.

According to DAV Assistant Principal Ram Chandra Khanal, cadres close the ANTO and ANNISU-R vandalised the buses that were on their way to pick up students. A group of people including the former teachers of the school sabotaged a bus (Ba 1 Kha 6421) near the Dhobighat area at 8am while the glasses of another vehicle (Ba 2 Kha 2444) were broken at Damkal Chowk in Lalitpur. Khanal informed that a car (Ba 6 Cha 9600) belonging to the school principal was also pelted with stones near Alka Hospital. “The act is highly anarchic. An attack on an academic institution can never be justified,” Khanal said.

However, the protesters have claimed that they resorted to minor vandalism after the school administration tried to foil its transport strike scheduled for Monday. “We had asked the school not to run vehicles for a day but they turned a deaf ear to our request,” said ANNISU-R President Sharad Rasaili. The unions have been protesting for the past five months after the school sacked the three teachers, citing their ‘incompetence and lack of professionalism’.

While Sagar Thapa and Santosh Jha had been fired in September, Rajendra Manandhar, who had been working in the school for five years, was sacked in mid-December. Manandhar was accused of conspiring against the school administration.

source: The Kathmandu Post,26 feb 2013