All India IIT Faculty Federation has announced that over 1300 faculty members of all seven IITs will go on a hunger strike for one day to protest against the irregularity in the pay structure.

According to the latest notification on pay structure by the HRD Ministry, there will be a cap on the promotion of IIT professors, and only 40 per cent of them will get the promotion to a senior grade after a period of six years.

Moreover, there will be a provision to hire Ph D holders as assistant professor on contract basis.

The federation has demanded that no upper cap should be imposed on the number of promotions.

The federation added that IITs have been following a flexible cadre system in which faculties get promotions on the basis of their performance. The system should be carried on to maintain the quality level of the institution.

Prof Gautam Baruah, Director of IIT Guwahati appealed the federation to rethink about the decision and not to go for the strike.

He said that faculties should convey their problems to their respective directors. He also asked the faculties to keep their patience as there is a meeting of the directors and the faculties regarding pay issue at IIT Delhi on Friday.

Baruah said that the faculty members should not panic as ministry is about to implement a performance-based incentive scheme. Under the scheme, the faculty member with good performance record will get incentives.