The ICAI president CA Naveen N D Gupta has enumerated the new initiatives by the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India ( ICAI ) to strengthen its member services.
“With its sincere efforts of leveraging technology to empower its stakeholders including its members and bringing various relevant services to their doorstep, ICAI keeps taking up significant initiatives in the interest of our members particularly,” he said.
Some of the initiatives are:
- Use ICAI’s UDIN to Protect Your Certifications/ Attestations: To address the instances of fake certifications and attestations against our members’ identity and also to address similar concerns as raised by various regulators of the country, a unique concept of UDIN (Unique Document Identification Number) has been conceptualized by the Institute. UDIN will be a unique number, generated for each and every document/ certificate/ report certified/ attested by practicing Chartered Accountants and registered with the UDIN portal, i.e. https://udin.icai.org/, which also has the relevant FAQs hosted. Central Council at its 374th meeting had decided to implement the UDIN concept, and, therefore, this has been made recommendatory with effect from 1st July 2018, and later on, it would be made mandatory.
- Live Webcasts: To update the membership on various professional developments, webcasts in all professional domains are regularly organised at ICAI. Over the last couple of months, webcasts were organised on How to build a Start Up (22nd May), Emerging India – From an NRI Perspective (28th May); Recent Developments in Real Estates: Impact of RERA, Taxation of Joint Developments, Affordable Housing, FEMA & FDI Issues in Real Estates (31st May); UAE VAT (9th June); ISA Assessment Test Module 5, 6 and 7: Systems Development: Acquisition, Maintenance and Implementation; Business Application Software Audit; Business Continuity Management (17th June); Capacity-Building Measures of Practitioners with Special Focus on Practice Management (27th June); Understanding and E-Filing the New Income-tax Return Form (23rd July); and Capacity-Building Measures of Practitioners with Special Focus on GST Audit (24th July).
- Career Ascent Programme: ICAI organized Career Ascent Programme in Mumbai on 29th June 2018, in Chennai on 30th June 2018 and in New Delhi on 30th June 2018, providing unique online platform to bring together experienced Chartered Accountants (who are looking for career advancement) and leading organisations (who want to recruit experienced CA professionals). So far, out of a total 1000 registered candidates, 22 interview teams from 17 organisations, carrying 291 vacancies, had shortlisted 870 candidates, out of which 369 candidates consented for the interview. Interviews have been conducted and results will come out soon.
- Startup Summit and Idea Placement Programme: A Startup Summit was organised in Mumbai on 29th June 2018 to connect the startups and the investors, which was attended by more than 400 participants. Inaugurated by Reliance ADA Group MD CA. Sateesh Seth and Sun Pharma CFO CA. Sudhir Valia, the programme had its participants on a fireside chat with the Future Group CEO Shri Kishore Biyani. Idea Placement Programme, another platform to bring the startups/ startup ideas and investors together, was held in Mumbai and Delhi on 29th and 30th June 2018 respectively, attracting appreciations and accolades from all participants.
- Web-Based Tax Cloud ITR & TDS Return Preparation Software: ICAI has arranged the Tax Cloud software on web-based ITR and TDS return preparation for the practising Chartered Accountants and CA firms free of cost for a period of two financial years.
- Knowledge Bank Portal: An ICAI portal http://kb.icai.org/, Your Gateway to ICAI Knowledge Bank, has been launched towards the consolidation of all publications of the Institute, with a search facility that includes the Institute’s Journal and Newsletters, Branches and Regional Councils, among others.
