Financial Auditing To Be Part Of New ICWAI Syllabus

Chartered Accountants would soon face competition from their professional cousins cost accountants. The Institute of Cost and Works Accountants of India (ICWAI) has decided to change syllabus to enable cost accountants to do financial auditing, the exclusive domain of CAs.

It is planning to restructure the course in such a way that a higher secondary passed student who completes the new six-month foundation course of five papers, the first in the three-phase course, would be suitable for bookkeeping in sectors like retail and BPO, as well as in the SME sector. They would be certified as business accountants.

The institute has started talking to Nasscom. It normally takes about three-and-a-half years for a higher secondary student and three years for a graduate to become cost accountants. The institute is planning to implement the new syllabus next year, before which it has to get clearance from the company affairs ministry. It may not be required in case the rules that allow institutes to amend their syllabus on their own come through by then.

The Chartered Institute of Management Accountants in UK and the Society for Management Accountants in Canada have allowed cost accountants to do financial auditing too, early this year, ICWAI V-P Chandra Wadhwa said.

ICAI does not see this as an infringement on its domain. Learning financial auditing will help cost accountants do cost auditing in a better way. The two institutes are sister organisations and there are no conflict between us, ICAI V-P Sunil Talati said.

Cost accountants are working to expand their horizon, even as the regulatory relevance of cost record keeping and cost auditing is being debated by the government. In fact, the cost audit branch under the ministry of company affairs is reviewing whether the cost account record keeping rules need to be rationalised. In the post-quota era, the government need not keep an eye on the private sectors capacity utilisation and efficiency.

COST FACTOR

ICWAI to implement the new syllabus next year

A higher secondary student who completes the six-month course of five papers will be suitable for bookkeeping