PESHAWAR: Employees of the University of Peshawar (UoP) staged a protest demonstration outside the Peshawar Press Club on Monday, demanding the immediate release of their salaries and pension payments, which they said have been pending for the past two months.
The protesting employees said they have not received their May salaries or pensions so far, while 50 percent of their April pension is also still outstanding. They alleged that delays in salary payments have become a routine matter, causing severe financial hardship for staff members.
The demonstration was led by Abdul Malik, President of University of Peshawar Employees Association, Imdad Khan, President of Class Four Union, and Lazar Masih, President of Sanitation Staff.
On this occasion, the protestors said that at present Class 3, Class 4 and Sanitation employees and pension holders are suffering from severe financial problems due to non-availability of salaries and pension for the last two months. And the stoves of their houses have become cold. Their children are being pulled out of schools while shopkeepers are now reluctant to give loans. He said that Peshawar University has been suffering from financial and administrative problems for the past several years and the salaries and pensions of the employees are never being paid on time.
The employees are still deprived of salary and pension for May and 2026, while 50% of April pension has also been paid, while the university administration is sleeping in a dream, while the provincial government has proved to be completely unserious and unable to solve financial problems. And sanitation employees are protesting in front of Peshawar Press Club in this intense heat.
They made it clear that at present the employees of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa universities are lower paid than the government employees of the whole of Pakistan. While DRA 2025 is still not being given to university employees, he said that many allowances which were taken by the employees of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa universities for years before the eighteenth amendment, those allowances have also been cut. That the provincial government should release the Malik Taluba funds for May and June salary and pension as soon as possible so that the employees will not be forced to protest and leave their pen and leave work and strike.
He said that if the funds are delayed further, we will be forced to close the University Road Peshawar for all kinds of traffic, which will be the responsibility of the provincial government.
