Chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Friday said she had called up human resource development minister Smriti Irani seeking a relaxation of the norm which she said was preventing untrained candidates from writing teachers eligibility tests.

For years, the Bengal government has been appointing untrained candidates as schoolteachers.

Senior officials of the human resource development ministry had told Metro earlier in the week that the Centre's policy of hiring only trained candidates as schoolteachers was inflexible.

Minister Irani had in July, during a visit to Bengal, asserted that the relaxation could not be extended. She had argued that the state had adequate number of trained candidates to fill up the vacant posts of schoolteachers.

Mamata had taken up the issue with Irani when the Union minister called on her at Nabanna in July.

The chief minister on Friday said in her room on the Assembly premises: "Today I called up the Union minister of human resource and development, seeking a relaxation. We are not being able to hold the recruitment test as the norm is not being relaxed. If required, I will speak to the minister during my visit to Delhi." The chief minister is expected to visit the capital soon.

The Centre had allowed the state to recruit untrained candidates as schoolteachers till March 31, 2014.

The chief minister said she had sought the relaxation granted to Assam, Uttarakhand, Tripura and Odisha.

Education minister Partha Chatterjee had on Monday said in the Assembly that the Centre had allowed Odisha, Uttarakhand and a few other states to recruit untrained candidates as schoolteachers till March 31, 2016, while denying Bengal a similar concession beyond March 31, 2014.

Officials of the ministry, however, denied having given any special relief to the four states.

They clarified that even untrained candidates can write the eligibility test.They will have to complete the training before being appointed as schoolteachers. But the state government seems to be in the dark about the rule.

What the government wants is that candidates lacking a BEd or a Diploma in Elementary Education degree be allowed to sit for the teachers eligibility test.

The chief minister's statement came several days after the West Bengal Board of Primary Education had posted on its website a notification, saying the eligibility test would be held "in terms of the National Council for Teachers' Education (NCTE) guideline", meaning only trained candidates would be able to write the test.