Vinod Rai, a 1972 batch IAS officer of Kerala cadre, took oath on Monday as the country's new Comptroller and Auditor General of India. Rai, who replaced V N Kaul, was administered the oath of office by President Pratibha Patil at a brief function at Rashtrapati Bhawan. Vice President Hamid Ansari, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Finance Minister P Chidambaram were among the dignitaries present at the ceremony.
The Comptroller and Auditor General of India on Friday criticised the previous National Democratic Alliance government for undervaluation of a number of public sector units, including Balco and VSNL, where equity was divested.\n\n
Reliance Industries has written to the government that it has no objection to the Comptroller and Auditor General of India auditing its gas field costs and said it is operating the field in compliance with rules.
The edtech major promised a learning revolution, offering hope to millions of under-educated youth. Now, those dreams are shattered, observes Devangshu Datta.
With the Comptroller and Auditor General slamming the government for buying the second-hand Admiral Gorshkov at the price of a new aircraft carrier, Navy Chief Admiral Sureesh Mehta on Thursday defended the price being paid by India for the warship.
State-run power firm NTPC overstated its profits by Rs 938 crore (R 9.38 billion) in 2007-08, the Comptroller and Auditor General of India said in a report, but categorically stated that chances of Satyam like frauds in PSUs are very remote.
In a first, the Comptroller and Auditor General's (CAG) officers reached out to several ministries in the last week of April as part of a confidence-boosting measure. The meeting brought the CAG officials and those from the ministries across the table to discuss the pain points in their relations. CAG of India Girish Chandra Murmu took this novel step because of growing tensions between those audited and the auditor.
The CAG, who blamed what he called a lack of accountability in bureaucracy for delays in action on audit reports, said officials who sit over them should be punished.
Reliance Industries on Wednesday assailed reports of the Comptroller and Auditor General and expert P Gopalakrishnan, which have alleged the company got undue benefits pertaining to Krishna-Godavari basin gas and its pricing.
The company's accounts were audited by CAG as its shareholders include public sector banks.
Most politicians and even non-politicians have been honoured because of what they were purported to be electorally worth for the ruling party of their time, argues N Sathiya Moorthy.
The P-8I, which is widely acknowledged to be the world's most deadly LRMR-ASW aircraft, is a derivative of the Boeing 737-800 airliner, onto which a plethora of sensors and weaponry has been fitted.
With the photo-identity card issue in the capital kicking up a major controversy, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Monday said that if there are any practical problems, these will be resolved. "I do not want to go into the motives. If there are any practical problems, we will resolve them," he told reporters on the sidelines of a function where the new Comptroller and Auditor General of India was sworn-in at the Rashtrapati Bhawan.
His appointment will be effective from the date he assumes charge of his office, an official statement said on Monday. An Indian Administrative Service officer of Kerala cadre, 1972 batch, Rai will take over from V N Kaul.
Railway officials also indicated that possible 'sabotage' and tampering with the electronic interlocking system, which detects the presence of trains, led to the Friday accident.
As CAG found Reliance Industries was being favoured in gas exploration deal to the government's detriment, former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh told the then top auditor Vinod Rai that audit should not hurt the private sector and RIL was one of the biggest and most respected.
US short seller Hindenburg Research has rejected Adani Group's charge that its report was an attack on India, saying a "fraud" cannot be obfuscated by nationalism or a bloated response that ignored response to key allegations. Commenting on the 413-page response Adani Group released late on Sunday evening in response to its report, Hindenburg said it believed India was a vibrant democracy and an emerging superpower with an exciting future and it was Adani Group which was holding it back through "systematic loot". Hindenburg stood by its last week's report that said its two-year investigation found Adani Group "engaged in a brazen stock manipulation and accounting fraud scheme over the course of decades".
Unable to face competition of a liberalised environment, as many as 88 public sector undertakings have eroded
Audit scrutiny of expenditure on foodgrains (Rs 37.4 crore) and cash dole (Rs 44.59 crore) revealed delay in distribution, doubtful purchase of material, doubtful distribution of foodgrain and non-submission of detailed contingent bills.
Comptroller and Auditor General of India V N Kaul said on Monday that there was a need to review government accounting system for bringing in transparency
Sitharaman also directed public sector bank heads to clear long pending vigilance cases against their officials for alleged malpractices.
Former CAG Rajiv Mehrishi says Centre has held back a report he submitted to the President, to end what he called "a nightmare of accounts that militates against good governance".
The veteran politician accused the BJP of breaking duly elected governments in opposition-ruled states even as it boasted about providing a stable government at the Centre.
The Comptroller and Auditor General of India, in a report tabled before the state assembly in Jammu, pointed out serious lapses in the procedures adopted by state-run health centres.
The electricity board lost Rs 1,111.35 crore owing to irregularities.
The Supreme Court on Friday directed the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) not to release funds until the state associations file an affidavit implementing recommendations of Justice (Retd.) RM Lodha-led- panel. Issuing the direction, the apex court said the state associations cannot get any money from the national cricket body till the time they follow the Lodha committee's recommendations.
The faculty of the Indian Institutes of Technology may be the most sought by the industry for consultancy work, but instead of getting paid for the job, they sometimes end up spending from their own pockets.
Faulty laws helped oil majors IOC, HPCL and BPCL -- to avoid excise payment of Rs 713 crore (Rs 7.13 billion) to the government during April-December 2002, the Comptroller and Auditor General of India has said.
Aadhaar is falling behind on technology, missing out on confidentiality and has gaps in its data archiving policy and preserving confidentiality in delivery of the cards to people, says a report by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG). The performance report, 'Functioning Of Unique Identification Authority Of India', tabled in Parliament on the last day of the budget session notes, assigning a unique identity to all resident Indians was supposed to be the key feature of Aadhaar. But "There were instances of issue of Aadhaar with the same biometric data to different residents indicating flaws in the de-duplication process and issue of Aadhaar on faulty biometrics and documents". It says close to half a million such records had to be cancelled by the Unique Identification Authority of India up to 2016.
Byju's, India's most-valued startup, has decided to put two of its key assets -- Epic and Great Learning -- on the block to generate $800 million-$1 billion in cash, with an aim to meet the edtech firm's various commitments, including repaying the entire $1.2 billion term loan B (TLB) within six months, according to sources. The cash-strapped company has proposed repaying $300 million of the $1.2 billion loan in the next three months, depending on whether the lenders accept Byju's amendment proposal, said the people familiar with the development. "This loan repayment proposal has been submitted to the lenders and conversations are going in the right direction," said a person in the know.
Virtually conceding the demands of the Left, the government has ordered a CBI probe into the privatisation of two Centaur Hotels in Mumbai in view of the anomalies pointed out by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India in the process.
'What has happened at Byju's is no surprise to anyone.'
The Delhi High Court-appointed observer Justice (Retd) Mukul Mudgal said that a former Deputy Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) will look after the tender process for the fourth cricket Test between India and South Africa starting next month.
The Comptroller and Auditor General has pulled up leading public sector undertakings for glaring lapses in balance sheets, saying assets were overstated by Rs 377.43 crore (Rs 3.77 billion) in four Navratna companies including SAIL.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday received Bhutan's highest civilian award, the 'Order of the Druk Gyalpo', making him the first foreign Head of the Government to receive the honour.
Yashvardhan Kumar Sinha was appointed as the chief information commissioner on Saturday, according to a Rashtrapati Bhavan statement.