- 2009-10
(http://www.rbi.org.in/Scripts/bs_viewcontent.aspx?Id=1965)
"During the year 2009-10, the following 15 PSBs have exercised managerial
autonomy in regard to selection and appointment of SBAs, viz. State Bank of
India, Allahabad Bank, Bank of Baroda, Bank of India, Bank of Maharashtra,
Canara Bank, Central Bank of India, Indian Overseas Bank, Oriental Bank of
Commerce, Punjab National Bank, Syndicate Bank, UCO Bank, Union Bank of
India, Punjab & Sind Bank and Andhra Bank.
The names of audit firms recommended by these 15 banks and approved by RBI
are displayed on the web-for list of names of firm please visit :
<http://www.rbi.org.in/Scripts/bs_viewcontent.aspx?Id=1965>
http://www.rbi.org.in/Scripts/bs_viewcontent.aspx?Id=1965
The names of auditors forwarded by RBI to the 11 PSBs which have not opted
for managerial autonomy for the year 2009-10 are also displayed on the
web-site.
The information in regard to branches allotted to these audit firms will be
published on the web-site, after receipt of the information from the
respective banks. Banks have been advised to furnish the information
regarding allocation of branches latest by April 30, 2010.
While forwarding names of audit firms, banks have been advised that not more
than three branches may be allotted per audit firm and that they should
allot branches, to the extent possible, to the audit firms taking into
consideration their category and audit experience in such a way that bigger
branches are audited by larger/experienced audit firms. It is not necessary
that all the audit firms whose names are forwarded by RBI to various banks
are allotted branch audit by the respective banks, as sufficiently higher
number of audit firms are forwarded to banks in order to enable them to
allot audit assignments as per their logistic requirements. It also often
happens that some of the audit firms whose names are forwarded are either
not allotted any audit assignment or are allotted assignment by some other
bank, after their names are returned back to RBI due to various reasons and
re-allotted/ considered for re-allotment, if any, required by some other
bank.
This is to inform you that due date of filing MVAT audit report in form-704
for the year ended on 31.03.2009 has been extended to 30.04.2010
(Source: STP Association, Mazgaon, Mumbai)
Soon, two firms may audit accounts of every company
March, 29th 2010
Will we see a company audited by two audit firms at the same time?
That looks a possibility from what the Union Minister of State for Corporate
Affairs and Minority Affairs, Mr Salman Khurshid, said here today.
Addressing a meeting of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), Mr
Khurshid said, in the context of making the audit function effective, that
there had emerged an idea of "dual audit so that there are two companies
(firms) in a sense keeping a check on each other."
Although leading auditors that Business Line spoke to seem to think that Mr
Khurshid was referring to "joint audit" - where two firms split the work
between themselves - the Minister was clearly referring to two audit firms
duplicating the work so as to keep a "check on each other."
Mr Khurshid said that if the Government and the industry approached the
issue with an open mind "innovative solutions can be found" to meet the
aspirations of the people.
He did say in his speech that the Government was not "overly concerned about
one or two major cases going wrong" - an allusion to the Satyam episode.
However, later in a chat with journalists, he said that the Government was
giving the Satyam investigations "high priority, so that the world knows
that we are not only back on our feet quickly after a knock but we also make
people accountable (for their wrong doings)."
Satyam impact
Clearly, the Satyam episode is influencing the thinking on the role of
auditors. The Minister seems to have meant as much when he said that the
Government had looked at countries that have mandatory rotation of auditors.
In India, there are two views about it, he said. While there is a consensus
that there should be rotation of partners of a firm in auditing an entity,
there is opposition to the rotation of firms themselves.
In another context in the speech, he named nominations, remunerations and
audit as the three areas where there has to be "transparent, independent and
objective assessments made within a company."
Government planning to give ICAI more power so that it can exercise more
control on Audit Firms
Mar 30, 2010 ICAI
To reinforce control over auditors, the government is planning to give the
regulator-Institute of Chartered Accountants of India-more teeth. Among the
options being considered by the ministry of corporate affairs is to make it
mandatory for a firm- Indian or foreign-doing audit to get a no-objection
certificate from the regulator before it gets registered as a company or a
limited liability partnership (LLP).
The auditors would also be required to wind up their display proceedings in
a shorter period of time.
Currently, any practising auditor has to register with ICAI in his/her
individual capacity, and is answerable to the statutory body for his/her
actions, but there is an absence of enforceable regulation on audit firms.
This has been exposed as a major regulatory loophole after the Satyam scam,
as the regulator largely looked helpless even as serious questions were
being raised about the role of the global audit firm, PriceWaterhouse.
According to a senior official, the Parliamentary Standing Committee
perusing the Companies Bill has strong views about the lax audit regulation.
One of the suggestions of the committee is to extend the ICAI's arms to the
audit "firms" also. Necessary changes could be made in Chartered Accountants
Act, 1949 and also the Companies Bill, the official said.
In a recent interview to FE, the global chairman of PricewaterhouseCoopers,
Dennis M Nally, had revealed the plan to amalgamate all partnerships and
related entities of PricewaterhouseCoopers in the country with the parent
organisation. The new regulations being planned would ensure that even as a
company or LLP (both of which are centrally monitored), the firm will have
to be answerable to ICAI for its audit-related activities in the country,
even as the overall operations of the company/LLP would be governed by the
government under the Companies Act/LLP Act, the official clarified.
Recently, the general council meeting of ICAI extensively discussed the
issue of creating transparency with regard to the operations of foreign
audit firms.
The council's suggestions would now forward its inputs to the ministry of
corporate affairs. "
When contacted ICAI president Amarjit Chopra declined to comment on the
government's plan to amend the Chartered Accountants Act to give the
regulator more teeth but said, "We are very clear on one thing that foreign
firms have to be made more accountable." Foreign audit firms like KPMG,
Ernst & Young and PwC declined to comment on the issue.
Income Tax department technically equipped to detect fraud or hidden
information
Mar 30, 2010 Income Tax
To outsmart tax evaders who resort to delete their financial data or hide
it in password-protected devices during search operations, the I-T
department has started including portable forensic labs and experts in its
team. The department has unearthed links to more than Rs 1,000 crore money
in the last few searches with the help of cyber forensics, according to
sources.
The search teams now visit premises of assesses equipped with pre-wiped
disks for imaging and cloning hard drives, portable labs for previewing
computer hard disks, evidence bags and tags to pack, label and transport the
imaged and cloned data to its labs.
Taxpayers and evaders have increasingly started using high-end softwares
like 'logic bomb' which deletes all files as soon as investigators try to
source information from the hardware.
While password protected CDs, DVDs, pen drives, MP3 players, ipods and SIM
cards are used to store and conceal the voluminous records of transactions
and payments to evade taxes, the sources said.
The department clones hard drives and other hardware in the presence of the
assessee and prepares a 'panchnama' with the help of forensic experts drawn
from the department or hired from outside. An on-the-spot seizure of the
electronic data is necessary after instances of "zero storage" happened when
the seized hardware was re-opened in department's forensic labs, they said.
The I-T authorities, in a recent search conducted on a prominent food and
spices manufacturer of the country, was faced with a unique problem when the
assessee provided a limited number of account books to the department
admitting a lower tax liability.
The cyber forensic team then went through the companies numerous hard drives
and ferreted out the hidden account books resulting in disclosure of
transactions to the tune of Rs 15 crore, the sources said.
The department also recovered Rs 74 crore of concealed income from an
on-spot analysis of servers when searches were conducted on a popular
apparel brand.
-CA.RAJU SHAH
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