CTETCentral Teacher Eligibility Test

The CTET is India’s national teacher eligibility test — and it is important to be clear about what that means: it is not a college-entrance exam and admits you to no course. It is a qualifying examination, introduced under the framework of the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education (RTE) Act, 2009 and NCTE guidelines (TETs began in 2011), that certifies candidates as eligible for appointment as teachers for Classes 1–8. You take it after (or in the final year of) your teaching qualification — D.El.Ed for the primary level, B.Ed or equivalent for the upper-primary level — and it is one requirement among several in actual recruitment.

The test has two papers, each with 150 multiple-choice questions carrying one mark apiece over two and a half hours, with no negative marking: Paper I for those who want to teach Classes 1–5 and Paper II for Classes 6–8 (aspirants for both levels sit both papers). A score of 60% is the qualifying benchmark, with relaxations for reserved categories applied by appointing authorities per their rules. A significant change announced by CBSE is that the CTET qualifying certificate is now valid for a lifetime, replacing the earlier seven-year validity.

CBSE conducts the CTET typically twice a year as an OMR-based offline test across the country. Qualifying it opens the door to recruitment in central-government school systems such as KVS and NVS and is widely recognized by private schools; most states run parallel state TETs (e.g., various State TETs and Super-TET-style recruitment layers) for their own schools. Because eligibility clauses map to the NCTE’s minimum-qualification norms and are updated periodically, candidates should always verify the current bulletin on ctet.nic.in.