Today we have Tejan Dargar, a qualified chartered accountant from The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI), sharing with us his chartered accounting journey and life in general.
Tejan is from Bhilwara, Rajasthan, India.
Note: The CA of ICAI consists of 3 levels. CPT, IPCC, and CA Final. One has to do a mandatory 3-year internship after clearing the IPCC exams.
MY JOURNEY as a chartered accountant
No, the choice wasn’t obvious. I had to choose which stream to pursue—Science, Commerce, or the Arts.
Science was a no-brainer for me (I detested physics), Arts was a no-brainer (who takes Arts with a 94% in 10th grade boards, “log kya kahenge”), and thus the answer is commerce.
The dilemma doesn’t end here; I wanted to do a course that gave me access to college life, so chartered accountancy wasn’t even on my mind!
I studied hard to ensure that I got an admission to the prestigious Sri Ram College of Commerce in Delhi, but God had his own plans. I missed out on admission to SRCC by a mere 0.75% and thus pursued Chartered Accountancy.
My Chartered Accountancy journey began with dreading classes for CPT (I finished second in a district full of CA students) and then IPCC (ICAI’s 2nd level CA Exam). I also cleared IPCC in the first attempt, scoring pretty well.
Now it was time for a 3-year internship at a chartered accounting firm.
My internship at Grant Thornton and BMR
I’ve always wanted to be more than just another bookworm who aced the Chartered Accountancy Exams on the first try.
Post-clearing IPCC, I decided that moving to Mumbai from Bhilwara in Rajasthan would be the best decision, as it would expose me to the glittering corporate world, frame my personality, and provide the best networking possibilities.
I also wanted to start my internship with a global brand to ensure that my above-mentioned objectives were met.
I applied to the Big 4 accounting firms in India but didn’t even get an interview call for lack of references! So if this is happening to you, it is okay; there is hope.
I believed that they would look at my academics and invite me for interviews, but this wasn’t the case.
Being a hustler, I understood the meaning of “When in Rome, do as the Romans do.”
I finally managed to get an interview call through some reference to an employee there.
And that’s how I started my internship in the Audit and Assurance Wing of Grant Thornton (GT).
I worked with the best talent and clients in the Audit and Control Testing domain of GT, but I still wanted to explore all the opportunities available to a Chartered Accountant student.
One day, while talking to a senior, I was told that it was almost impossible to get into this international and corporate tax firm called BMR. He mentioned that the interview process was super tough, much more difficult than the Big 4 accounting firms.
My curiosity increased, and the desire to at least get interviewed by BMR became my goal. I managed to get the email ID of the HR through a friend’s contact who was working with BMR. I wrote an email highlighting academics and making special mention of my experience at GT.
After multiple rounds of telephonic and face-to-face interviews, we were hired (my twin brother, Viren Dargar, also joined BMR).
Lessons Learned:
- The lesson I learned from this incident was that networking could take you places.
- Be it through LinkedIn or any other social channel, don’t be reluctant to send cold messages or emails to the employees who are working in your dream organization and say how you can add value to that organization.
- Also, never give up.
Why I took a transfer from GT to BMR
- My goals in joining BMR and leaving GT were to gain a diverse set of experiences that would allow me to explore different avenues and determine which field is best for me.
- I believe this is the most important advantage of the transfer mechanism at the institute.
- I also want to break this notion that “transfers are not possible.”
- This works best when done at the start of the career, as it is always better to fail early. You get up, clean yourself, and get back to work.
- I also firmly believe that there are two modes of learning: through observing others’ experiences and by experiencing them yourself. The latter one is the more costly one in terms of time (we have limited time on earth). Hence, the former is most advisable.
My experience at BMR
- First Day at BMR: As I enter the workplace, I find people having endless rounds of discussion on the interpretation of tax laws, conferences with clients happening in the conference rooms, a huge library and people finding the relevant case laws to strengthen their case, printers working in full force and outputting 100-page submissions, and suited people rushing out of the office to meet the tax officers or reach the tribunal.
- First Assignment: My first assignment was to analyze the tax laws of various countries like the Netherlands, Ireland, the UAE, and Mauritius, inter alia, to help find the client the most favorable jurisdiction to establish a holding company for their business. It seems pretty complex, right? Hell yes, it was.
- After reading dozens of tax treaties and articles, speaking to lawyers in different jurisdictions, and discussing with my senior, the so-called interesting task of making a PowerPoint presentation started.
- And alas, after I finished the task, I was informed that the font size, alignment, color to be used in the smart charts, and a dozen other things need to be according to BMR standards. Not to mention that my designated buddy, who was supposed to tell me all of this, hadn’t come to the office.
- Later assignments that I worked on taught me drafting skills, presentation skills, and Excel modelling skills.
- As interns, we attended meetings with lawyers who represented our clients, thus giving me an opportunity to meet some of the best corporate tax lawyers in the country.
- A call with clients and explaining to them BMR’s opinion on a particular case was so fulfilling. Reading two case laws every day (as suggested by my director in charge) was a toll, but it made my understanding so strong.
- Life was tough with CA classes from 7 to 10 in the morning and late-night sittings in the office, but the excitement of learning something new every day and working on the toughest tax cases outweighed all the tiredness.
- And after all, winning the intern of the year award boosted my confidence.
- Oh, and how can I forget the most loved culture of BMR—parties?
- Participating in corporate sports tournaments, marathons, and other events instilled in us a sense of team spirit.
- And in my stint with BMR, I grew from a timid guy to a confident one, from a student to a true professional.
- I also made some great friends here and built amazing industry contacts!
- All I can say is that I truly lived the spirit of BMR and stood by the BMR tagline, “Challenge Us.”
Entering the Glorious World of Investments and Capital Markets
- After qualifying as a chartered accountant, the “capital markets” bug bit me, and I wanted to venture into a work area where I could closely observe and learn about the stock markets.
- After applying for many opportunities, I finally got selected by Edelweiss in their multi-strategy department.
- At Edelweiss, I got to work with new and evolving alternative investment funds, portfolio management schemes, and mutual funds and gained experience establishing an Ireland-based fund.
- I worked with some of the best talents in the industry.
- Initially, it was tough to work on something that wasn’t my forte, but the skill set that I had gained while working with BMR and Grant Thornton helped greatly. Also, the knowledge acquired during the chartered accounting course proved to be of great help.
- The most interesting assignment here at Edelweiss was to establish an Ireland-based fund, which led me to be in constant touch with various service providers (lawyers, custodians, administrators) in Ireland and exposed me to the way Europe functions.
My Journey with Failure
I have had some tough moments in life, but I chose to overcome them.
Be open and, at the same time, be afraid of failure, because this fear of failure makes us work harder to achieve success.
Here are a few instances where I faced failure:
- Not getting admission into one of my dream colleges, SRCC.
- A startup that, after months of planning, couldn’t last two months of execution
- Memorizing was not my thing! In any case, a Chartered Accountancy course is also a memory game to some extent. I remember that four months before the CA Final exams, I was still attending classes; I hadn’t started studying anything on my own. And then one of the professors in the class told us that those who haven’t started studying and who do not have a great memory shouldn’t think about clearing the exam on the coming attempt. I was depressed, but I couldn’t afford to give up. I pushed myself, and it paid off—I passed the exam.
- I didn’t get an internship in a Big 10 accounting firm after trying for three months. With a great score in the CA IPCC exams and relatively good communication skills, it was a great disappointment for me. But I had made the decision to work for a large firm, and it had paid off. I had given hundreds of interviews, walked into multiple firms personally handing over copies of my resume (sometimes to the security guard), and it had paid off. I got an internship opportunity with Grant Thornton. Here, networking on LinkedIn really helped me.
- The first few months at BMR were the most difficult of my professional life. The work pressure was too difficult to handle, and the culture was alien to me. I was recognized for superior professional contribution at BMR a year later.
- Most of the time, we focus so much on our weaknesses that we fail to focus on our strengths. This happened to me as well. I was not great at interpreting laws but was good at and inclined toward assignments that involved complicated MS Excel and PowerPoint skills. I struggled for a long time with my weak areas (not denying that I worked on them and improved) while completely ignoring my strengths.Ultimately, I worked on one such assignment utilising my strengths, and that assignment received so much appreciation from my seniors and peers. So all I can say is, “Play to your strengths.”
TO CONCLUDE…
I will end this with a quote by Epictetus: “We don’t control what happens to us; all we control are our thoughts and reactions to what happens to us.”
Remember that: You’re defined in this life not by your good luck or your bad luck, but by your reaction to those strokes of fortune. “Don’t let anyone tell you differently,” he concluded.
