SSC Havaldar PET PST Syllabus

Physical tests apply to one post in this recruitment. Havaldar in the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs and the Central Bureau of Narcotics. Candidates who applied only for Multi Tasking Staff posts are never called for them.

Both tests are qualifying. Neither adds a mark to the merit list, and failing either ends the candidature for Havaldar posts whatever your computer based examination score was.

Physical Efficiency Test

Test	Male candidates	Female candidates
Walking	1,600 metres in 15 minutes	1 kilometre in 20 minutes

This is a walking test, not a run. Sixteen hundred metres in fifteen minutes works out to a steady 6.4 kilometres an hour, which most reasonably fit candidates can hold without training. Most, not all, and it is worth walking the distance against a clock once before the day rather than finding out at the centre.

Physical Standard Test

Male candidates

Standard	Requirement
Height	157.5 cm
Chest	81 cm fully expanded, with a minimum expansion of 5 cm

Height is relaxable by 5 cm for Garhwalis, Assamese, Gorkhas and members of Scheduled Tribes.

Female candidates

Standard	Requirement
Height	152 cm
Weight	48 kg

Height is relaxable by 2.5 cm and weight by 2 kg for Gorkhas, Garhwalis, Assamese and members of Scheduled Tribes.

How and where the tests are held

The PET and PST for Havaldar posts are conducted by CBIC and CBN at centres they finalise, rather than by the Commission itself. Candidates may be called to a centre anywhere in the country, so budget for travel.

Candidates who are found to be pregnant of twelve weeks standing or over are declared temporarily unfit and their candidature is held in abeyance until after confinement. They are re-examined for the Physical Efficiency Test six weeks after the date of confinement, on production of a medical certificate of fitness from a registered medical practitioner. Vacancies against temporarily unfit candidates are kept unfilled in the final result.

Exemptions apply for candidates with benchmark disabilities as set out in the recruitment rules.

What to do before the test

Carry originals of everything the call letter asks for. Category certificates matter more here than at any other stage, because the height and chest relaxations are only applied against a valid certificate in the prescribed format.

Chest measurement is taken unexpanded and expanded, and the five centimetre expansion is a real requirement rather than a formality. Candidates who meet the 81 cm figure but cannot expand by five centimetres do not pass.

The gap between the computer based examination result and the physical test is usually weeks rather than months. That is enough time to prepare for a walking test and not enough for anything else, which is the main argument for treating the written paper as the priority and the physical test as a checklist.