ICAI organizes two-day Corporate Conclave

The Committee for Members in Industry (CMII) of The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India today unveiled its “National Convention” under the 7th ICAI Corporate Forum. The two-day annual congregation of India’s chartered accountants included a Corporate Conclave, Financial Services Expo & ICAI Awards 2013. The award function will held in New Delhi on 11th Jan 2014.

The Corporate Conclave aims to facilitate brainstorming on a number of contemporary topics, which are relevant to the members of ICAI and will keep them updated in this dynamic environment.  The deliberations at the Corporate Conclave also seek to enhance the skill sets of the members.

During the first day of the conference, CA. Keki Mistry, Vice Chairman & CEO HDFC Ltd., India’s leading home loan company, spoke about the state of the Indian economy & the housing sector in the Post financial crisis period.

In his address, Mr. Mistry said that reducing demand pressure in the economy to combat inflation increases the risk of a downturn and that has a direct bearing on job creation. “We need to create 8 million new jobs every year and employ young talent and this needs to be done in the time frame of 2-3 years. If new jobs are not created, the demographic dividend will become demographic deficit and this will have a far greater social impact,” he said.  Mr. Mistry added that there is a need to promote entrepreneurship with particular focus on small and medium enterprises.  He pointed out that the main driver of inflation in the Indian economy is food prices and there was an urgent need to stabilize them. He emphasized that unless the government takes specific steps to revamp agriculture, raise output, and smoothen supply chain management, high food inflation will be a recurring phenomenon and continue to bother the common man and policy makers.

Sudhanshu Pandey,   Joint Secretary, Ministry of Commerce and Industry, said in his address at the Conclave that while Indian chartered accountants should be prepared to meet global challenges and noted that Indian chartered accountants had the potential to become global leaders in this profession.

“We have the power of becoming global leaders but we still work as surrogate firms.  Together we can find a solution for a better future of CA industry,” he said. He also emphasized on the knowledge economy and foreign Internship programmers which will be helpful in tie-ups with different countries to spread Indian chartered accountancy courses overseas.

Other key speakers included Mr. Kapil Bansal, Head – Treasury Advisory Group, HDFC Bank, who spoke at length about Treasury Functions and detailed their Uses & Abuses and CA. Ganesh Balakrishnan, FCA, who shared his views on the Conceptual Framework & Convergence of IFRS in India. CA. P. K Jain, Director Finance, GAIL India Ltd. spoke about Transfer Pricing while CA. S. P Garg, Director Finance, ONGC Videsh Ltd spoke about Cross Border Mergers and Amalgamations.

Mr. Vinod Mandlik, Head Corporate Indirect Tax, TCS, CA. R. Nagarajan, Director Finance, PFC Ltd., and Mr. K. Biswal, Director Finance, NTPC Ltd also shared their thoughts on key topics.

On the occasion, CA.  K Raghu, Vice  President, ICAI said, “The Corporate Conclave provides an excellent platform for India’s brightest minds in the field of accountancy and finance to discuss and debate a number of burning issues that concern the profession and the overall business environment.  This meet becomes all the more important since our economy and the industrial sector is currently at a critical juncture.”

CA. Vijay Kumar Gupta, Chairman CMII said, “Over the years, the ICAI Corporate Forum has emerged as a pre-eminent platform among India Inc for the quality, depth and exchange of thoughts on a wide variety of issues. The platform also gives us an opportunity to honor chartered accountants, who are doing excellent work for their companies and contributing their bit for the development of the nation.”