Visakhapatnam: In what could be a great relief for assistant professors serving under contract at all state universities, the state government has decided to first address their employment issues before proceeding further with the regular assistant professor recruitment process. Though the Andhra Pradesh Public Service Commission (APPSC) conducted a screening test for the 1,044 assistant professor posts back in March, the recruitment process was later caught in a legal tangle. Now even after the legal hurdles are cleared and merit lists are ready, the state government will defer the process for a few weeks.The contract assistant professors were caught in a double bind after the government had first announced of filling about 1,385 professor vacancies through a common recruitment instead of absorbing them into regular services. They had launched a relay hunger strike and continued it for about a month in November-December 2017. The state government had also appointed a four-member committee to look into their issues. The committee toured all the state varsities in the first half of 2018 to solicit the views of the contract faculty and submitted a consolidated report to the state government.All the state universities have been reeling from a serious staff crunch over the last few years as there has been no recruitment for about a decade. Many departments are operated with one professor or contract-based professors.

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