West Bengal: Revised cut-off: Many more may apply for teachers’ jobs

KOLKATA: Lakhs of more aspirants are likely to get the opportunity to apply for the 2022 teacher recruitment drive with the West Bengal Board of Primary Education on Monday indicating that it would revise the application cut-off score for reserved-category candidates from the earlier 82.5 in Teacher Eligibility Test (TET) to 82.
WBBPE also declared that 2014 and 2017 TET qualifiers would be given certificates, mentioning their scores, before the registration portal for the recruitment closes on November 14.
The Calcutta High Court on November 3 had allowed 21 reserved-category candidates, who were earlier declared “disqualified”, to apply for the 2022 primary teacher recruitment drive. Their TET score was 82 out of 150 (54.6%), a little short of the WBBPE’s 82.5 (55%) set for TET 2014 and 2017. Around 85 candidates had moved court, pleading that 54.6% be construed as 55%, rounding off the numbers after decimal.
The board on Monday said they would now revise the cut-off score to 82. WBBPE president Goutam Paul said, “We learnt from the court order that the total number of petitioners was 85. The actual number could be much higher. We will allow other candidates to have 82.5 cut-off marks according to the NCTE norms. We can assure none would be deprived.” But Pal did not mention the number of TET qualifiers would would benefit from this.
A total of 20 lakh candidates had appeared for TET in 2015, based on the ad published in 2014. Around 1.2 lakh candidates cleared the exams. In 2021, 2.4 lakh candidates took TET, based on the 2017 ad. Among them, 9,896 candidates qualified.
WBBPE also declared that 2014 and 2017 TET qualified candidates would be issued certificates before the registration portal for the recruitment process was closed on November 14. According to the NCTE guidelines, every TET-qualified candidate should be given a certificate with score on it. This is the first time that the board is going to issue the certificate by mentioning the TET score on it. “The 2017 candidates will get their TET certificates with the scores and those would cleared the 2014 exams, will have their certificates uploaded within three-four days,” said Paul.