Customs Sepoy Written Exam cheat sheet

The Constitution of India was adopted on 26 November 1949 and came into force on 26 January 1950; 26 January is observed as Republic Day.

The President of India is the constitutional head of state; the Prime Minister heads the Council of Ministers and the real executive power.

The Union Budget is presented annually by the Finance Minister; the Economic Survey precedes it and reviews the economy of the previous year.

India's currency is the rupee, issued by the Reserve Bank of India; the RBI was nationalised in 1949 and regulates monetary policy.

The United Nations was founded on 24 October 1945; its principal organs include the General Assembly, Security Council and Secretariat.

SAARC has eight member states: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

The World Trade Organization, established in 1995, administers trade agreements and settles disputes among member countries.

India's space programme is run by ISRO; Chandrayaan-3 achieved a soft landing near the lunar south pole in August 2023.

Nobel Prizes are awarded annually in Physics, Chemistry, Medicine, Literature, Peace and Economic Sciences; the Peace Prize is announced in Oslo.

Subject-verb agreement: a singular subject takes a singular verb; collective nouns take a singular verb when acting as one unit.

Articles: 'a' before consonant sounds, 'an' before vowel sounds, 'the' for specific or unique references.

Active to passive: move the object to subject position and use the past participle with the correct form of 'be'.

Direct to indirect speech: change the reporting verb tense and shift pronouns and time expressions (now becomes then, today becomes that day).

Common prepositions: 'since' with a point of time, 'for' with a duration, 'between' for two items, 'among' for more than two.

Synonyms replace a word without changing meaning; antonyms express the opposite meaning.

Idiom meaning is not literal: 'to bite the bullet' means to endure a difficult situation bravely.

Reading comprehension: locate the main idea in the opening or closing sentence and answer strictly from the passage.

Spotting errors: check subject-verb agreement, tense consistency, article use and preposition choice in that order.

Percentage change equals (new value minus old value) divided by old value, multiplied by 100.

Simple interest equals principal times rate times time divided by 100; compound interest uses principal times (1 plus rate/100) raised to the number of years.

Profit percent equals profit divided by cost price times 100; selling price equals cost price times (100 plus profit percent) divided by 100.

Average equals sum of observations divided by number of observations; the average of an arithmetic sequence is the mean of its first and last terms.

Speed equals distance divided by time; to convert km/h to m/s multiply by 5/18, and to convert m/s to km/h multiply by 18/5.

Time and work: if a person finishes work in n days, one day's work is 1/n; combined rate is the sum of individual rates.

Area formulas: rectangle length times breadth; triangle half base times height; circle pi times radius squared; circumference 2 pi r.

Ratio and proportion: if a:b equals c:d then ad equals bc; divide a quantity in ratio m:n by using parts m and n of the total.

Permutation counts arrangements (order matters); combination counts selections (order does not matter); nCr equals n factorial divided by r factorial times (n minus r) factorial.

The Customs Act, 1962 governs levy and collection of customs duties, warehousing, and prevention of smuggling in India.

Basic customs duty is levied under Section 12 of the Customs Act; additional duties may apply under other provisions.

Import declarations are filed in electronic form (Bill of Entry); export declarations are filed as the Shipping Bill.

The Customs Tariff Act, 1975 provides the schedule of rates of duty and the classification framework for imported and exported goods.

Goods may be stored in a customs bonded warehouse without payment of duty until clearance, subject to prescribed conditions.

Baggage rules allow duty-free allowances for passengers within prescribed limits; goods beyond the limit attract duty.

The Customs Valuation Rules determine the assessable value, generally the transaction value plus adjustments for freight and insurance.

Drawback provides refund of duty on imported inputs used in export goods, subject to rules and time limits.

Smuggling of notified goods is punishable under the Customs Act with confiscation, penalty and possible prosecution.

A computer's main components are input devices, output devices, the central processing unit and memory.

RAM is volatile working memory; ROM is non-volatile and retains firmware such as the BIOS.

The operating system manages hardware, files and processes; examples include Windows, Linux and macOS.

A byte is 8 bits; 1 kilobyte is 1024 bytes, 1 megabyte is 1024 kilobytes, and 1 gigabyte is 1024 megabytes.

Common file extensions: .docx for documents, .xlsx for spreadsheets, .pdf for portable documents, .exe for executables.

A spreadsheet formula begins with an equals sign; cell references like A1 can be relative or absolute ($A$1).

An IP address identifies a device on a network; IPv4 uses 32 bits and IPv6 uses 128 bits.

Email fields: To is the primary recipient, Cc is a visible copy, and Bcc is a hidden copy.

Ctrl+C copies, Ctrl+V pastes, Ctrl+X cuts, Ctrl+Z undoes and Ctrl+S saves in most applications.

The Preamble declares India a sovereign, socialist, secular, democratic republic committed to justice, liberty, equality and fraternity.

Fundamental Rights are in Part III (Articles 12 to 35); the Right to Constitutional Remedies under Article 32 is called the heart and soul of the Constitution.

Directive Principles of State Policy are in Part IV (Articles 36 to 51) and are non-justiciable but fundamental in governance.

Fundamental Duties are listed in Article 51A, added by the 42nd Amendment Act, 1976.

The three organs of government are the legislature, executive and judiciary; the doctrine of separation of powers assigns distinct functions.

National security involves protecting territorial integrity, sovereignty and internal stability against external and internal threats.

The armed forces are the Army, Navy and Air Force; paramilitary and central police forces assist in border and internal security.

Citizenship in India is governed by the Citizenship Act, 1955, covering birth, descent, registration, naturalisation and incorporation of territory.

Elections are conducted by the Election Commission of India, a constitutional body under Article 324.