Art teachers across TN have alleged that several special teacher candidates have changed their caste and handicapped status in order to be selected for government jobs by the Teachers' Recruitment Board. Take this for sample: one of the teachers had been initially listed as Scheduled Caste but was listed as OBC in the final list. Ironically, she was also listed as a widow initially but was also part of the handicapped list.
Arts Teachers Welfare Association President SA Rajkumar said there have been several violations of norms during the special teachers' selection process. Similar to the teacher mentioned above, another Vellore candidate's caste was mentioned as SC in the certificate verification but it was later changed to SC (Arunthathiar) in the final list. Similarly, a few other candidates' castes were changed from SC (General) in the certificate verification lists to SC in the final list, Rajkumar said.
The TRB published the special teacher tentative provisional selection list on October 12. In the list, of the 1325 posts, 172 were reserved. In the final list, selection of candidates for only 1257 posts was finalised. There was no proper explanation about the remaining 68 posts, he added.
"The TRB has asked candidates to submit their Tamil medium certificates. However, the Directorate of Government Examinations, which is conducting the government technical exam, has refused to issue such certificates. However, 51 candidates submitted Tamil medium certificates to the Teachers' Recruitment Board and got selected. We do not know where these candidates got the Tamil medium certificate from," he said.
According to sources in the school education department, as per the norms, candidates with Government Technical Teachers certificate alone are eligible for special teacher posts. However, the TRB allowed candidates with private institution certificates to write the exam, which is a violation.
When contacted, the TRB chairperson S Jayanthi said she was out of town and could not comment on the issue yet
