In the wake of the Satyam fraud, the Institute of Company Secretaries of India (ICSI) aims to train about 500 independent directors of the country’s public sector undertakings (PSUs) as well as private enterprises by the end of 2009.
The training curriculum of ICSI will focus on corporate governance and ethics.
“ICSI has already trained 60 officers of the Life Insurance Corporation of India on corporate governance and ethics on a face-to-face mode. We have organized similar training programmes for the directors of Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited. The directors of Punjab National Bank have also evinced interest in our programme”, NK Jain, secretary and chief executive officer, ICSI told Business Standard. “Our aim is to train at least 500 independent directors of PSUs as well as private companies in the country on corporate governance and ethics by the end of this year. These training programmes are being organised by ICSI in the light of the recent Satyam fiasco which has raised questions on the corporate practices and ethics of India Inc”, he added.
The training programme on corporate governance is of two to three days in duration and they are being imparted either at ICSI’s head office or at its regional councils.
ICSI is also exploring the possibility of offering its programme through the video-conferencing mode.
Meanwhile, the institute expects to finalise its proposed Vision 2020 document by the end of this year.
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The Vision 2020 document is expected to focus on the changing dynamics of the company secretary profession and it will help ICSI to gear itself for challenges in the future. The document seeks qualitative as well as quantitative improvement of ICSI.
“We have come up with a detailed questionnaire for the different stakeholders for the proposed Vision 2020 document and we expect the document to be finalised by the end of this year”, said Jain.
Earlier, ICSI had constituted a 13-member core group comprising some highly acclaimed practicing company secretaries as well as professionals from other disciplines like management for drafting the Vision 2020 document.
Asked on ICSI’s plans to set up overseas centres, Jain said, apart from Dubai, ICSI is exploring the possibilities of setting up its overseas centres in Singapore, UK and South Africa but the details for such centres are yet to be worked out.
At present, ICSI has about 22,000 members and the institute is targeting a pool of over 50,000 professionals by 2015. There are over 70 chapters of ICSI across the country and the figure is expected to go up to around 100 by the end of 2010.