CA G.Ramaswamy,

Presiden,

Institute of C A of India,

New Delhi

Respected sir,

First accept my hearty congratulations.

Actually I wanted to raise some issue at the meeting held at Chennai on Sunday 20th February 2011. As no opportunity was given either to member or student due to want to time, now I would like to put it in writing my views and suggestions:

  1. MEF: Every CA know what MEF stands for. It stands for Multipurpose Empanelment Form. I would like to know what purpose it serves other than Bank Branch Audit. CAG takes care of all PSU and they have their own way of empanelment which they host in their site in January every year. Further National Highways, AIDS corporation, Panchayath, Municipalities etc have their own way of recruiting the auditor for various works. Even each bank has their own way of selecting auditors for Concurrent audit, Revenue audit, System audit etc. Under such circumstances what role the data submitted through MEF will be useful to ICAI other than bank branch audit?
  2. For MEF empanelment, the cut off date is taken as 1st January every year. Don’t you think it is ridiculous to assume 1st January as cut off date for a report which will be signed by CAs after 15 months ?.
  3. Often people at the helm of affair suggest to form a partnership firm with more number of partners rather than a small firm of less than 5 partners. In my opinion if the cut of date is changed 1st July instead of 1st January, the chances of merger of small firms may increase because no CA wants to change the constitution in January, pending bank branch allotment in March. Further as normally ICAI finalises the list foe MEF in August/September every year, it is but better to have the cut off date as on 1st July instead of 1st January.
  4. I feel that the soft ware used in our ICAI for empanelment of MEF needs to be updated for the following reason. . For category iii, the condition is that

The firm or at least one of the partners(CAs) should have preferably conducted branch audit of a nationalized bank or of a private sector bank with deposits not less than Rs.500 crore for at least 3 years.

But if a firm is less than 3 years old and if one of the partners has got more than 3 years bank branch audit experience the system classifies the firm as Part 3 – not eligible. It has happened to me till my firm completed three years of bank branch audit, even though I had three years bank audit experience.

  1. As per RBI norms, as mentioned above, if two practicing CAs without any bank branch audit experience but practicing for 10 years, forms a firm, they may never get eligibility, because neither the firm nor individual partners has got bank branch audit experience whereas a fresh CA with three years of practice is eligible to get empanelled under category iv. In my opinion firms which can not be classified under category i, ii or iii must be included under category iv, provided at least one of the partners has got three years of practice,
  2. Senior CAs who have retired from service must be given preference for selecting as Examiners, Coordinators, observers.
  3. All the metro cities were small in size in 70s. But now the area as well as the number of CAs in these cities have increased considerably. Therefore, I feel that such cities must be sub divided into three or four branches for effective control and they must function independently like other branches.
  4. It is high time Chennai must have a new building for ICAI as existing building is not sufficient to cope with development and there is no sufficient hall to accommodate important seminar/ meetings. Every year for budget meeting, the present Brahmayya hall in not sufficient to accommodate all members who attend and members are forced to stand and observe the proceedings. If we have our own hall that can accommodate more members, several seminars which are organised in leading hotels, may be accommodated in our own hall and it may also reduce the cost of seminars.
  5. Even though SIRC at Chennai arranges coaching classes at Chennai, quite a lot number of students all over south, seek to join private institutes by paying almost 10 times the fees charged by ICAI .When I had asked several student the reason for the same, they replied that the standard of coaching in private institute is excellent and the coaching in SIRC is not up to mark and are not happy. The irony is that in private institutes the faculties are our own members.
  6. Is it not possible to have some guest houses in all metro cities to enable members, and council member to stay during their visit at a nominal charges instead of spending huge amount to hotels.?

I do know that it is easily said than done; but yet I felt it is necessary to bring to your notice.

Regards,

Mohamed Shafi