In the midst of the raging controversy involving the government and the Indian Institutes of Management, the apex body of chartered accountants on Friday apprehended that the move by the Centre for empowerment to issue directions through amendment in the CA Bill could lead to the loss of its autonomy.
The Chartered Accountants (Amendment) Bill proposes to substitute Section 30(A) with a new section aimed at empowering the government to issue directions to the institute.
This, the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India president Sunil Goyal said, could undermine the autonomy of the institute. He told PTI that ICAI was "not consulted" before preparing the proposed Bill.
"What is the need for such a section" when the government does not want to interfere in the administrative, technical or educational policies of the institute, he asked.
This submission assumes importance, especially in view of the controversies surrounding the human resources ministry's decision to cut fees at the Indian Institutes of Management and the alleged 'saffronisation' of NCERT syllabus.
ICAI sources said they failed to understand the logic behind the move, which could possibly be a way of bureaucratising the institute.
Set up under an Act of Parliament, ICAI functions under the department of company affairs in the ministry of finance.
The government is also understood to have demanded more seats in the ICAI council for its nominees, but Goyal said the institute was not in a position to do so.
The institute could at best raise the number of seats for government nominees to eight in the proposed 40-member council against the demand for 10 seats.
Goyal said ICAI had no problem with the presence of government nominees in its council for the last 50 years, but it was not in a position to entertain the Centre's demand for 10 seats.
At present the ICAI council comprises 30 seats, six of them are for government nominees, who do not have any voting powers.
The remaining 24 seats of ICAI council comprise members from North, East, West, South and Central councils.
ICAI is now proposing to increase the number of seats to 40 in view of the need for broadbasing the representation.
ICAI is the premier accounting body in the country and is contributing in the fields of education, professional development, maintenance of high accounting, auditing and ethical standards.
