ICAI needs 6 months to complete satyam auditor probe

Mumbai, Feb 13: The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI) has announced that it will take six more months to determine the extent of the involvement of the company's auditor in the Satyam fraud.

Uttam Prakash Aggarwal, President, ICAI said that whether the auditors (PriceWater House Coopers) are guilty of falsifying accounts or not will become clear as soon as the investigation is completed.

"The fact as to whether the auditors were innocent or whether they were negligent or in the worst case scenario, they were hand in glove with the chairman in falsifying the accounts. We will no doubt come out with the investigation being done by several agencies including the disciplinary mechanism of the ICAI," said Uttam Prakash Aggarwal.

Meanwhile, L K Advani, senior leader of Bharathiya Janata Party (BJP), termed the Satyam fraud as a 'government scandal' and demanded a judicial enquiry into the country's largest corporate scam.

Advani said that a CBI probe was insufficient and a judicial probe was needed into the case for the truth to be known.

"It is not a corporate fraud. It is a Governmental scandal. Therefore, no CBI enquiry is necessary. A judicial enquiry is needed. A commission of enquiry is needed in the scandals in Andhra which has given you also a bad name otherwise the corporate sector did not have a bad name before Satyam," Advani said.

Andhra Pradesh police had arrested Satyam founder Ramalinga Raju and others in connection with the rupees 7,800 crore accounting fraud in Satyam Computer Services Limited.

Subsequently, Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy had recommended a CBI probe into the fraud.

Ramalinga Raju, his brother Rama Raju, former Chief Financial Officer Srinivas Vadlamani are currently held in a jail in Hyderabad.

ANI