No need to be in final year to give Teachers Eligibility Test: Madras High Court
MADURAI: Observing that teacher training students need not be in the final year of their course for them to be eligible to write Teachers Eligibility Test (TET), the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court recently dismissed an appeal filed by the Teachers Recruitment Board.
The board was challenging an order passed by a single judge of the court setting aside the rejection of the candidature of five TET candidates in the 2022 TET exam. The candidates, though successful in the written examination, were later rejected by TRB as they were only in their second year of B.Ed degree while appearing for the exam.
A bench comprising justices J Nisha Banu and S Srimathy, who heard the appeal, referred to a judgment passed by the Supreme Court in 2021, in which it had been held that declaration of result, date of filling up of the forms, appearing in the examination, etc. cannot be the criteria to appear for the TET examination.
The National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE) had also clarified its guidelines on August 4, 2022 by stating that a person who has been admitted in the training course and pursuing it can appear in the TET. Hence, the rejection of the petitioners’ candidature is not justified, the judges opined.