Interview with Akshay Losalka- AIR-3 in CA Final November 2013

Akshay Losalka

AIR-3 in CA Final November 2013

In an exclusive interview with Anurag Singal, founder of cajobportal.com, 

here's what Akshay had to convey to budding CA finalists

a.  A brief story of your CA journey and your future dreams

-The reason why I am into this CA course is because of my aunt, who herself is a Chartered Accountant, and she inspired me and also my elder brother to get into this profession. At the time of clearing CPT I didn’t had any idea what I am getting into, or how tough this course was, but when I started taking tuitions for IPCC, then I realised that it was not at all an easy task. I prepared for the IPCC exams, and eventually I landed up getting AIR 38^th – it was a great feeling, got congrats from my family, friends and relatives. Then the real task started – i.e  searching for articleship, and then those three years of articleship together with tuitions, and that huge never ending syllabus of CA finals. Further that expectation of doing great in finals, of everyone added to the pressure . But the amount of knowledge that this course provided me together with those three years of practical exposure is something which has no match. Finally getting a call from the president of the institute itself, and hearing that you have achieved AIR 3^rd is like a dream come true, and I couldn’t have asked for any better end of this journey.

So this entire journey of various ups and downs, struggles, and also some happy moments together with the constant support of my family, friends, teachers and relatives, taught me an important lesson – that “there is no alternative to hard work for success”.

But now I am a part of this CA community and a new journey has started, and I would like to excel myself in this field as well and explore industrial applications of the knowledge that I have acquired. I am also very fond of teaching, so in future I would be looking forward to get into that profession as well.

b) What were the challenges you faced  

 -Some of the major challenges were –

The first year of article ship together with the morning college classes from 6 to 9 AM.

 Managing tuitions with article ship.

Completing that huge syllabus of CA final.

Coping with the pressure of huge expectations of others from me for doing good in finals.

c) Overall approach to the exam

-For me CA exams was all about testing our logic and conceptual understanding of every subject. My objective was to cover maximum portion of the syllabus, and revising it for at least two times before the exams. I focused on understanding the concepts rather than mugging it, and tried to score good in practicals.

d) Subject wise strategy for the 8 papers

  -I took tuition for 5 practical based subjects and for law, Audit and ISKA, I followed Munish Bhandari, Surbhi Bansal, and practice manual respectively. MAFA and DT were the subjects in which I had to work a little extra. The subjects for which I took tuitions, I just followed the tuition notes.

e) Useful tips while answering questions during exams

-Try to attempt the entire paper, and answer all the questions to the point. Careful reading of questions before answering prevents a lot of silly mistakes. And also the choice of as to which questions we should attempt first, followed by others is also important i.e, try to answer those questions first, which you are more confident about.

f)  General advice to examinees

-Work hard, be organised and follow your own routine for completing the syllabus, and stay patient.