Madras HC Imposes Interim Stay On Release Of Teacher Eligibility Test Results

Chennai: The Madras High Court on Wednesday imposed an interim stay on the release of the Teacher Eligibility Test (TET) results. The case came up for hearing before Justice P T Asha. During the proceedings, the Tamil Nadu government informed the court that a policy decision regarding the reduction of qualifying marks for the general category is set to be taken.

Adjourning the hearing to July 24 to allow for this policy decision to be conveyed to the court, the judge ordered that the results of the TET should not be published in the interim.

Following the enactment of the Right to Education Act in 2009, the Supreme Court mandated a qualifying test for teachers. Furthermore, in May, an order was issued extending the deadline by three years for teachers due to retire within five years to pass this eligibility test.

A government order was issued last January reducing the minimum qualifying marks from 55% to 50% for Backward Classes, Most Backward Classes, Denotified Communities, and differently abled persons, and from 45% to 40% for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes.

Three teachers belonging to the general category — including Ramakrishnan, who was appointed in 2010 — filed a case in the Madras High Court seeking a reduction in the minimum qualifying marks for the general category from 60% to 50%.

In their petition, the petitioners stated, "In the state of Bihar, a notification was issued fixing the minimum qualifying marks at 50% for general category teachers applying for postgraduate teacher posts. We had requested the government to fix the minimum qualifying marks at 50% for general category teachers in Tamil Nadu as well, just as in Bihar. However, the representation submitted regarding this matter was not considered."

The TET was conducted across Tamil Nadu on July 4 and 5. A total of 59,535 teachers appeared for Paper I of the examination, while 1,60,929 teachers appeared for Paper II.

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