Auditors

For a Viksit Bharat, India cannot afford audit standards that are inferior, NFRA Chairperson Ajay Bhushan Pandey said

Sources said that the regulator could soon notify the new standards for select entities

NFRA found that the auditors deliberately chose to shy away from their statutory duty to report the fraud and protect the public interest

The finance ministry on Wednesday said more than 34.84 lakh audit reports, including about 34.09 lakh Tax Audit Reports (TARs), have been filed for assessment year 2024-25 on the e-filing portal till October 7. The income tax department had extended the date for filing the audit report from September 30 to October 7. There is an increase in the filing of TARs for the AY 2024-25 by around 4.8 per cent compared to the filings of TARs on the due date for AY 2023-24. "To assist taxpayers, the department conducted extensive outreach programmes through emails, SMSs, webinars, social media campaigns and messages on the Income Tax portal to create and raise awareness among the taxpayers about filing TARs and other audit forms by the due date. Various user awareness videos were uploaded on the Income Tax portal to provide guidance," the ministry said in a release. It further said that these concerted efforts have been helpful to taxpayers and tax professionals in timely compliance in filing

The NFRA report highlights serious violations of Section 144 of the Companies Act, which bans firms from offering certain non-audit services to their audit clients

The revised standards hold that the group auditor is ultimately responsible for the audit

Auditors of PSBs, their branches, and PSUs will not be covered by ISA 600

The Standard on Auditing (SA) 570 requires the auditor to obtain sufficient appropriate audit evidence that a company is a going concern and will continue its operations for the foreseeable future

NFRA has issued orders against several audit firms in India in the past, including the "Big Four", around the auditors' independence and their non-audit work

The National Financial Reporting Authority (NFRA) has slapped penalties totalling Rs 2.5 crore on two auditors for professional misconduct and auditing lapses in the Reliance Commercial Finance case for FY2018-19. The audit regulator imposed a fine of Rs 2 crore on Shridhar & Associates and Rs 50 lakh on Ajay Vastani. In addition, the regulator also barred Vastani for 5 years from undertaking any audit in respect of financial statements or internal audit of the functions and activities of any company or body corporate. The order came after the corporate affairs ministry informed NFRA that Price Waterhouse & Co Chartered Accountants LLP (PW) had filed a report to the ministry under the Companies Act, 2013. Thereafter, PW resigned as the auditor of RCFL, without issuing an audit report for FY 2018-19. Further, Shridhar & Associates was appointed by the board of directors of RCFL in June 2019 as the statutory auditor of the company. On examination of the audit file of RCFL ...

The auditors at Big Five firms said the remuneration does not justify the risks, work stress, and investments in technology and talent

Zomato on Sunday said the auditor of its subsidiaries Zomato Hyperpure and Blink Commerce has resigned with immediate effect, paving the way for the food tech platform's auditor Deloitte Haskins & Sells to be appointed in its place to make the audit process more efficient. Batliboi & Associates, who was appointed as statutory auditors of the two wholly-owned subsidiaries for five years beginning April 1, 2023, till the conclusion of the 13th AGM, resigned w.e.f. May 12, 2024, Zomato said in a regulatory filing. "Further to our various discussions and email dated May 8, 2024, from the Global Controller Finance, Zomato Limited, we understand that the holding company's management wants to align the statutory auditor of the company with the auditors of the holding company responsible for the audit of consol accounts to avoid some duplication and bring some efficiencies in the audit process at group level," Batliboi & Associates stated. In the regulatory filing, Zomato informed

The average audit fee in India was Rs 0.93 crore per company in FY23, up from Rs 0.91 crore in FY22

The National Financial Reporting Authority (NFRA) has slapped penalties totalling Rs 4.5 crore on an audit firm and two auditors for professional misconduct for alleged auditing lapses of Reliance Capital's financials in 2018-19. A fine of Rs 3 crore has been imposed on Pathak H D & Associates, Rs 1 crore on Parimal Kumar Jha and Rs 50 lakh on Vishal D Shah. Besides, Jha and Shah have been debarred from taking up audit work for 10 years and 5 years, respectively, according to an order. Jha was the Engagement Partner (EP) and Shah was the Engagement Quality Control Review (EQCR) Partner for the statutory audit of Reliance Capital for 2018-19 fiscal. For 2018-19, the company was jointly audited by Price Waterhouse & Co LLP (PW) and Pathak HD & Associates. PW reported suspected fraud regarding loans and investments amounting to approximately Rs 12,571 crore to some group companies. In the order dated April 12, the NFRA said that despite the reporting of suspected fraud and ...

If one reads the Companies Act, Code of Ethics, and Standards of Audit and Quality Control in a harmonious manner, then one would not have any confusion about definition of non-audit services, he said

In its firm-wide review of audit control systems of BSR & Co, the Authority found that the firm's claim of being independent from KPMG India entities was unacceptable

Auditor Deloitte has expressed doubt about on-demand delivery platform's ability to continue as a going concern

In a statement on Wednesday, Adani Group rejected any suggestions that the company and its business have not acted as per the regulations and accounting standards of the jurisdictions they operated in

The National Financial Reporting Authority, or NFRA, has in recent weeks started an inquiry into one of the member firms of EY in India

Capital markets regulator Sebi on Friday extended the relaxation to entities with listed non-convertible securities from dispatching physical copies of the financial statements to the holders of such securities till September 30, 2024. Earlier, the regulator had given similar relaxations to such entities till September 2023. Sebi's extension comes after the Ministry of Corporate Affairs last month provided similar relaxations to entities from dispatching physical copies of financial statements, including board's report, auditor's report or other documents. "Consequently, it has been decided to relax, up to September 30, 2024, the requirements of regulation 58 (1)(b) of the Sebi Listing Regulations," according to the circular issued by the markets regulator on Friday. Under the regulation 58 (1)(b) of the Sebi Listing Regulations, an entity with listed non-convertible securities will have to send a hard copy of statement containing the salient features of all the documents to those