States » EastPosted at: Oct 29 2026 6:12PM


Bengal may link teachers’ salary hikes to students’ learning outcomes from next academic year

Kolkata, October 29 (UNI): The West Bengal government is considering linking teachers’ annual salary increments and promotions in primary schools to students’ learning outcomes from the next academic year, School Education Minister Deepak Barman said on Thursday.
Addressing a meeting on administrative, infrastructural and academic issues at the West Bengal Council of Higher Secondary Education, Barman said teachers would be held accountable for the progress of students assigned to them and would have to explain why they deserved a salary increment if their students failed to show adequate improvement.
The meeting was attended by chairpersons of primary education councils from 21 districts, the presidents of the primary and secondary education boards and the Higher Secondary Council, and Higher Education Minister Jagannath Chatterjee.
Explaining the proposed system, Barman said the government did not believe that separate teachers for Bengali, English, geography and mathematics were necessary at the primary level.
Teachers appointed after completing the prescribed selection process would be capable of teaching primary schoolchildren across subjects, he said.
The government is considering a system under which one teacher would be assigned to a class on a particular day, with teachers rotating between classes on different days.
Illustrating the principle of accountability, Barman said, “The responsibility for the students admitted this year rests with me, Deepak Barman. Suppose there are 20 children in a class. At the end of the year, the responsibility for what they have achieved and how much they have learnt rests entirely with Deepak Barman. This is the sense of responsibility we want to establish.”
He said if 15 out of 20 students in a class failed to learn to read or did not show overall improvement, the teacher concerned would have to explain the reasons for the poor performance.
“We will ask that teacher why their salary should be increased the following year. The teacher will have to provide an explanation,” the minister said, adding that discussions would be held to identify the reasons whenever a student failed to make progress.
Barman also stressed that responsibility for academically underperforming students should be shared among all teachers in a school.
He expressed hope that clearly assigning responsibility would improve the overall quality of education.
“When responsibility is clearly defined, dedication also increases,” he said. Addressing those present at the meeting, he added, “None of you should try to become a spokesperson for the government.”
On the student-teacher ratio, the minister claimed that primary schools currently had one teacher for every 26 students, while the ratio at the secondary level was higher, at around 50 to 52 students per teacher.
He said the appointment of at least 13,000 teachers at the primary level in the near future would bring the ratio down to one teacher for every 20 students.
The government would also work to reduce the ratio at the secondary level, he added.
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