For the local Scheduled Caste (SC) and Scheduled Tribe (ST) aspirants of Jharkhand Teacher Eligibility Test (TET), the State Government is likely to reduce the qualifying marks. On the directive of Human Resource Development (HRD) Minister Geetashree Oraon, the officials are working on reducing the qualifying scores for the two reserved categories compared to that of Other Backward Class (OBC) and General.
“HRD minister Geetashree Oraon has written us a letter stating the need to make various amendments in the recruitment process of JTET. Presently, the qualifying marks for SC, ST and OBC in JTET are 52 percent, obtained out of the total 150 marks. For General category it is 60 percent. Since most of the SC and ST candidates hail from far off villages, the minister wants their marks reduction for qualifying the TET,” Primary Education Director Jeetwahan Oraon told The Pioneer on Saturday.
He added, “This would be amended for the next JTET as merit list preparation for ongoing teacher’s appointment is in the last phase. I will be forwarding the file regarding this issue to HRD Principal Secretary K Vidyasagar on Monday. Thereafter, it will be sent to Minister Geetashree Oraon, Chief Secretary and Chief Minister Hemant Soren for sanction.”
However, Jeetwahan Oraon expressed his helplessness in following the minister’s instruction to appoint only the domiciles of Jharkhand in general category too. “All statements made by Geetashree Oraon for State domiciles cannot be amended as there is no official existence of Domicile Policy here,” he pointed out.
In case, the mentioned amendment is done, it will benefit SC and ST candidates appearing for both class 1 to 5 (lower primary) as well as class 6 to 8 (upper primary) levels under TET. Appointments for class 6 to 8 would probably commence from August. HRD department is discussing on production of domicile certificates by the unreserved category teachers during counseling.
Chief Minister Hemant Soren and Geetashree Oraon had told the mediapersons on July 24 that government is making all efforts to support domiciles of Jharkhand in TET.
At present, it is mandatory to produce caste and domicile certificates for claiming reserved category seats. No such requirements are asked for unreserved seats. Geetashree Oraon has also assured of giving a chance to those candidates whose TET results were declared late. Jharkhand Academic Council (JAC) had published the last JTET result on May 2013. 65, 439 teachers had passed. Pending result of 375 candidates was published by JAC in February.
