It is always a special feeling for me to be able to interact with CA students and guide them in whatever way I possibly can. In this post, I will try to answer one-by-one, all the queries I had received over the past few days...
Q. How should we plan revision for CA Inter Nov'20 exams?
A. The revision plan will depend upon the time remaining in hand after you have finished reading the study material, notes, etc. It will also depend upon the level of confidence you generate after reading all the stuff.
Suppose you have finished reading up all the subjects once, and practicing all the questions of the practical subjects once, by the end of August. With the 60 days remaining, you need to plan out the revision schedule in a way that you can revise, practice questions and also solve past papers and mock test papers.
While this is a very rough way of putting it, you can revise the entire syllabus of CA Inter in just one month. I have already 2 posts related to this, and there is a major announcement coming up in the next few days on how I plan to spend more time to discuss such issues in much greater detail. Till that time, you can munch on these 2 posts which are relevant to your question.
How do I revise all the subjects of CA Final in 2 months? (although this post caters to CA Final, it would hold good for CA Inter also)
Hope this helps... Please stay tuned for more such posts...
Q. I tend to procrastinate in my studies. I try hard but just cannot get myself out of my phone. I know this is wrong, and I am feeling the pressure now. Can you help me out?
A. Frankly speaking, it is just the mindset that allows the person to procrastinate things. In my opinion, there are 2 types of people who procrastinate -
one who gets activated by the rush of the adrenaline and sits down to study just the night before the exams, or
one who doesn't even realize that rush of adrenaline and suffers from lack of adequate prep due to distractions and pre-occupations. What the result could be of such a person, you can very well imagine.
I am assuming you belong to the first type. Whatever may be the reasons for your habit of spending the whole day on the phone - please identify them and eliminate them to the extent possible. If you are pursuing CA, it is not going to be possible to clear exams without adequate studies.
My advice would be to submit your phone to your parents or elder sibling (as per your choice) to start with when sitting down to study. Alternatively, you can just lock your phone in your cupboard and lose the key of the cupboard for the duration you plan to study. By doing this, you will learn to fight the urge to look up at the phone at regular intervals. You will daydream initially, maybe crib a bit as well. But you will slowly learn to fight it all out. Once you have won over this urge, things should crease out soon. Remember, CA is not about the hours of study you put in, it is about the quality of the study.
If you have not already browsed through my website, I have already written posts regarding this, sensing it to be a major problem for students during prep time. In one of them, I have also talked about the 55-5 Rule which I used to follow personally. You may look that up as well. Here are the links to some of the relevant posts;
If you are experiencing trouble in setting up a study timetable for yourself, you may refer to a series of posts on this topic here:
CA exams require a lot of discipline and self-control. I hope this answer would help you overcome your shortcomings
Q. Till what date the CA Inter coaching classes need to be completed so that I can start studying for the exams?
A. Do you ask your heart to stop functioning when the food in your stomach is getting digested? No, right? Then how can you ask the coaching classes to be stopped and only then you will sit down to study? There cannot be and should not be a cutoff date for the completion of classes and you sitting down to study. It all has to work simultaneously.
So the straight answer to your question is... There is no hard and fast rule here. I have seen people finish off their classes in July and sit down to study at home in peace. I have also come across people who have attended classes till September end and scored Ranks. So it all depends upon how strong your preparation is, in tandem with your coaching classes. It all has to work as a synchronized system, not as an assembly line.
Q. I have quite a lot to study and I am really worried. Is there a way to complete the entire portion for November 2020 CA Inter exam?
A. Absolutely yes... Let's do a little math here... There are still over 2300 hours to go before you sit for the first paper of Accounting on 2nd Nov. 2020. This is a huge amount of time at your disposal. Even if end up studying for 1000 hours out of these 2300 hours (just 43% of your time), at a rate of say, 20 pages per hour, you can easily cover 20,000 pages - which in my view is twice the Inter syllabus!
A couple of things to be pointed out here though...
Yes, the volume is huge and the time is limited. But that is true for all CA students appearing for Nov'20 Inter exams, right? So first of all, stop perceiving it as a burden or pressure. It's pretty normal.
Secondly, with proper planning and strategy, you can finish the entire syllabus easily within 800 to 1000 hours. The catch is to stay away from all distractions, especially your phone. CA is a course where discipline and self-control are precious qualities to have in any student.
If you want to know how you can plan your studies and complete the syllabus well within time, please follow this space regularly. There is a major announcement coming from me in this direction soon!
Q. How to learn and revise the humongous theory subjects of CA Foundation in 1 day?
A. It is virtually impossible to revise everything in the 1 day before the exams. So it is better not to try it at all. The groundwork for making things easier to revise a day before the exams start at least 3 months before the exams - which is now (If you are preparing for the Nov.'20 exams).
You can do a couple of things here - whichever suits you best:
What you can do is to prepare short notes on each topic of each subject you study. It is advisable that you maintain separate copies for each subject. All you need to write in these copies is the summary of the topic you study - the heading, important keywords (CA exams are all about keywords and terminologies), important terms, definitions, important section numbers (in case of Law), etc. This will enable you to revise quickly by just going through this notebook of short notes.
Alternatively, you can put in a little extra effort and ensure that whatever you are studying gets saved in the ROM of your brain, and not the RAM. Because the RAM is short-lived and easily formattable. You close one book, read half the other, and you'll forget whatever you have studied in the first book. For many students, this re-writing happens on a chapter basis, instead of a book basis.
How do you save everything in the ROM of your brain?
I have covered this in my post How should I study the theory subjects for CA exams?
This post talks about a scientifically proven technique to study theory subjects in a way that if you read anything once, there is a very high probability that you won't forget it easily and will be able to recollect it easily whenever required.
Q. What has helped you score rank in all levels in your CA journey as well as CS?
A. Interesting question... I feel that there were a lot of factors at play. I plan to write a lot more about my strategies in future posts, probably a series of posts. But here, I would discuss just a couple of major points:
The first major factor was obviously studying through the study materials of the ICAI or ICSI. During my time, there was not so much of a run after notes and PDFs, which I now witness through a few Telegram groups I am a part of. As it is the volume was huge, and I did not want to enlarge it further by referring to this or that teacher's notes. Notes are bound to be useful otherwise the teacher would not have prepared them at the first place. But I made it a point to avoid running after them.
The second most important factor was self-study. I did take classes for 3 subjects in CA Final - Accounts, Cost and SFM - but I had to prepare them all again from scratch by myself when I got my study leave. I did not take any classes for CA Foundation, CA Intermediate and all the 3 levels of CS. Yes, it was tough, even challenging at times. But at the end of it all, I had command over whatever I had studied. I had developed my own understanding of concepts, knew what was expected of me when writing answers in the exams, and how my answers were going to be judged by the ICAI or ICSI. This self-awareness was also a major factor.
Q. Will CA exams happen in Nov.'20 because COVID is increasing day by day?
A. This is a tough one for me to answer. The present situation throughout the country is very grim. With record cases being "reported" every day, we still seem to be far from reaching the peak. And we are all aware that any vaccine will take time.
Despite all this, the ICAI stands firm in its decision to conduct exams in November 2020. I definitely hope the thinktank is closely monitoring the situation, and any decision on the conduct of the exams will be in the interest of the CA students.
Whatever happens, I would strongly urge all CA students to focus on their studies without any let down in intensity. I had advised everyone in June 2020 the same thing, and my stance on this stays the same. We can only do whatever is in our control. And the thing in our control is studying. We should not let ourselves down by not being focused or committed enough.
So leave everything to God, and study hard for the exams.
Q. Will ICAI module be enough for CA Inter?
A. Yes and No.
This is a subjective answer and it would vary from person to person depending on what goals he has set for himself from the exams. And I answer such questions with a pinch of salt (and spice as well :p)
For someone just wanting to pass, there is no need for the ICAI module. The tuition notes would suffice.
For someone aiming for exemption, the ICAI module is the best.
For someone aiming for a rank, you need to do something extra along with the ICAI modules. What is that extra? Please refer to my post here Should reference books other than ICAI material be used for CA Intermediate Exam?
Q. How did you get the Amazon advertisements on your website? Is this website owned by Amazon?
A. Hahaha... No no, this is not an Amazon website. It is solely and wholly owned by me.
The thing is that I have a tie-up with Amazon India. So Amazon India allows me to advertise its products on my website. However, the catch is that unlike the normal Ads you see on the other websites, I get to earn from my website only when anyone uses my website to shop on Amazon India and the total amount earned from such orders crosses Rs. 1,000/-. Only then will Amazon start paying me something.
Even in that case, I plan to retain only 50% of whatever I earn from your orders on Amazon India, and return the remaining amount back to you. So basically, once I get any commission from Amazon due to your orders, half of it goes back to you. This amount may range anywhere from 1% of your order value to even 50% - it all depends on what you have ordered. This is true for almost all the products sold by Amazon India (except mobile phones), even Prime subscriptions.
For this, the only thing you need to do is to place orders on Amazon India only through my website and get in touch with me as soon as your order is shipped.
I hope this answers your query :)
Hope this helps you all... Please let me know in the comments section if you have any follow-ups, comments, or feedback. I would be happy to take them up. Wish you the best!