The Hindu Business Line : A compact study of a hundred CA exams

How far has the CA brand been popular in the country, over these years? One measure would be to look at the inflow of students for the entry-level exams of the ICAI. Remember that what is now called PE-I, has had different names, such as Foundation and Entrance, at different times.

During a quarter century, beginning 1956, the number of candidates who appeared for the entry-level exams was 15,686.

This number grew almost ten-fold during the period 1976 to 1992. And that more than doubled during the decade 1993-2003, to reach 3,27,268. So, if you come across somebody saying that CA course is losing its charm with students, you may ask for numbers to back up.

Myth of low passes

Introduce yourself as a CA student and immediately there are sympathies showered, because a common perception is that the course is too tough to pass. Read this excerpt from the Report of the examiners on the `First' (later Intermediate) examination in May 1952:

"The question paper was neither difficult nor lengthy. It is however surprising that only a small percentage of the candidates attempted all the questions, thus indicating that the students who appeared in this examination were not inclined to cover the whole course during their study.

"From the answer books one gets the feeling that the candidates have poor expression and some times it is difficult to find out what they actually mean."

Any professional examination attempts to measure the mastery each examinee has of the topics included in such examination.

Examiners gauge the degree of proficiency of examinees by the manner in which acquired knowledge is applied to the problems and questions set. Difficult, yes, for the unprepared; and, different, too, from college exams. But if you are among the many who think that results are deliberately kept at single digit percentages, you have to look at the statistics to realise your folly.

Over the last five decades, in almost a hundred exams, more than one in five students who faced the entry-level hurdle came through.

Between 1956 and 2003, almost 5-lakh students took this level exam, and more than a lakh cleared the same, achieving a pass percentage of 23. For the more recent November 2002 and May 2003 exams, this percentage is higher at 26.

Young and bright

Every new generation seems to be brighter than the previous one. So, along with increase in numbers enrolled, there has been a good jump in pass percentage too.

The number of appearances till 1992 vis-à-vis the past decade showed an increase of 100 per cent. Results of number of students passing also went up by 133 per cent.

Introduction of Foundation as entry requirement for articleship resulted in a phenomenal growth in the past decade. The course attracted the cream among students at a relatively young age.

The CRET report 1998 also commended the performance of the Foundation students: "The analysis of examination results really indicate the students joining the Chartered Accountancy course through the Foundation stream have done well and, in fact, relatively better as compared to students enrolling through the graduation stream.

Further, a very large number of such students figure in the merit list of Intermediate and Final examinations (First 50 rank holders)." (Para 4.1.3)

Failures at the starting point

Three-to-four out of five students have been failing at the entry point, and so that merits some study. The ICAI does not publish statistics of how the students failed.

Therefore, an analysis was attempted using a random sample of 860 candidates at one of the exam centres, with data sourced from the SIRC News Letter of November 1997.

Total failures were 76 per cent and their break up is as follows, based on how many papers they failed in: One paper only — 18 per cent; two papers — 22; three — 15; all the four papers — 15; and lost in the aggregate — 5 per cent.

As you may know, pass requires a minimum of 40 in each of the four papers and an average (queerly called `aggregate' in CA circles) of 50.

An in-depth analysis of failure, if carried out, would offer insights on how we may enhance the success rate.

At least one reason is obvious — that in comparison with entry-level exams for other professional courses, CA lacks due emphasis on objective questions.

Intermediate performance

Similar to the Foundation stream, growth in the appearance at the Intermediate exams in the past decade as compared to the earlier years till 1993 showed an increase of almost 50 per cent.

This increase can be clearly attributed to the successful Foundation students joining the Intermediate course. Performance of students in November was found to be better than that of May, though overall there was no significant improvement.

Performance of students was found to be abysmally low in the last four examinations conducted in May.

Charts tell all

The gap between appeared and passed is the desert of failures where candidates perish.

For Intermediate, presentation is made of Groups I and II, apart from the numbers taking `Both' groups, in absolute numbers; percentages of passes, however, are presented as three lines, for Groups I and II, and `Both'.

Data for Intermediate has been considered from 1978 onwards because there were no `Groups' before that year.

Don't let the sharp fall in 2003 make you sleepless, because the data considers only May 2003 results; statistics for November 2003 exams are not out yet.

Further work

It will be interesting to study the difference in the performance, on the whole, between boys and girls, between Hindi and English medium, and also among metros and other exam centres.

To access Mentor archives visit www.thehindubusinessline.com\mn\arcmn.htm

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