RAWALPINDI, May 23: The Punjab Teachers Union and All Pakistan Clerks Association on Monday said they would hold sit-in in front of Parliament House on Wednesday in support of their long-standing demands.

Speaking at a joint press conference, the leaders of the two associations said that their members from across the country had started arriving Rawalpindi-Islamabad for the Wednesday's show.

Punjab Teachers Union President Sajjad Akbar Kazmi said that the entire registered members of the union had been asked to move towards Islamabad.

“The total number of our members is 300,000,” he said adding the Subject Specialists Association, Punjab, have also consented to join the protest demonstration.

Similarly, All Pakistan Clerks Association's president Sardar Mohammad Hanif said that 2.2 million clerks from across the country had been invited to the protest.

Mr Kazmi said even after three years of its constitution the pay and pension commission had not made any progress towards revising the pay scale. “The constitution of the commission was a sheer waste of money,” he added.

“We want raise in salaries in accordance with the inflation rate, house rent, medical allowances and revision of pay scales. We have waited a lot but now time has come to take to the street in support of our demands,” Mr Akbar Kazmi said.

To a question that why his union was not pressing Punjab government for their demands, he said that majority of teachers' issues were to be addressed by the centre adding that if the federal government wanted to improve their lives, it should allocate financial package in the upcoming budget.

He claimed that the sit-in and protest rally would be the biggest in capital's history.

Replying to question he said no permission had been sought for holding the protest rally.

Clerks' community representative Sardar Hanif said, “The existing salary package could hardly meet ends of the clerk. Our children have no future and we cannot even afford to buy mutton. We have taken on board teachers union and subject specialists association in order to press the government effectively,” he said.

President Subject Specialist Association Rana Munir Atta said that over 130,000 subject specialists were facing the same problems like those of government teachers and vowed to get their demands fulfilled through a series of protests.

TAXILA: The United Teachers Front on Monday said it would stage a sit-in in front of parliament house for acceptance of their demands.

Front's vice-president, Punjab chapter, Imtiaz Abbasi; vice-president Punjab Teachers Union, Rawalpindi district, Sajid Masood Abbasi, Syed Zulfiqar Shah and Jehangir Ashraf told a press conference that they would launch a protest against the Punjab and federal governments demanding substantial increase in their salaries in the upcoming budget.

They said the package announced in 2009 for schoolteachers could not be implemented in some districts while many teachers were also deprived of promotions.

They said the ever-increasing inflation had made the lives of schoolteachers miserable. They criticised the government for ignoring teachers' problems.