Even as the Punjab Government continues to highlight its Sikhya Kranti campaign to improve education standards in government schools, teachers in Ludhiana say they are being increasingly pulled out of classrooms and assigned one survey after another.Just days after the statewide drug census duty that concluded on June 13, Education Department has deployed 57 lecturers from various government schools in the district for duties under Mawa Dhiaan Satkar Yojana. The teachers have been directed to attend a meeting at District Institute of Education and Training in Jagraon before taking up further work related to the scheme.The new assignment has come while many teachers are already engaged in the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise. Teachers say back-to-back duties are affecting their ability to focus on academics at the start of the new session.Teacher organisations have strongly criticised the growing burden of non-academic work. Rupinder Singh Gill, general secretary of Democratic Teachers Front, Ludhiana, said there was a contradiction between the government’s claims of strengthening education and the reality on the ground.“On one hand, the government is talking about Sikhya Kranti, but on the other, it seems determined to empty schools of teachers. Almost every government assignment is being handed over to teachers. Every day, long lists of duties related to SIR, the drug census, and now Mawa Dhiaan Satkar Yojana are being issued,” Gill said.He alleged that teachers were being reduced to data operators and survey staff instead of educators. “The teaching community is under immense pressure and frustration. Teachers are spending a significant amount of time on data collection and survey work, which directly affects classroom teaching,” he added.Gill said Democratic Teachers Front strongly condemned the diversion of teachers from their primary responsibility of educating students. He warned that if the government continued assigning excessive non-teaching duties at the cost of education, the organisation would be compelled to launch an agitation.According to Education Department officials, teachers have now been assigned another survey duty. Under the Mawa Dhiaan survey, enrolment for the Rs 1,000 scheme for women is underway across the state, and teachers are currently being used as data operators for it.