Tatas await decision on plea to ban Deloitte, BSR

MUMBAI: Tata Group chairman N Chandrasekaran has said that the enterprise will await the final decision on the government’s petition to ban

Deloitte

Haskins & Sells and

KPMG

affiliate BSR & Associates from auditing books for five years.


“The audit committee and the board of directors are seized of the matter. If there is a situation we have to react to, we will do so in an appropriate manner,” said Chandrasekaran at group flagship TCS’ annual shareholders meet here.

BSR is the auditor of TCS and its five-year term with the IT services major ends in fiscal 2022. Besides TCS, BSR audits the books of Tata Motors, where its five-year tenure too ends in fiscal 2022 (rules mandate rotation of auditors every five years).

On the other hand, Deloitte is the auditor of Tata Global Beverages. The government has sought the ban of the two auditing firms for their alleged role in concealing bad loans at IL&FS Financial Services. Both the firms had denied any wrongdoing. The matter is pending at the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT).

If the ban comes to play, it will be a setback for the two firms of the so called Big Four club (the rest two are EY and

PwC

) and will lead to 300-plus listed companies shifting their business to other audit firms.

However, Price Waterhouse, the audit arm of PwC, will not be able to take any new assignments of listed companies as it is been banned by markets regulator Sebi over the fraud at

Satyam Computers

. This ban, though, ends next year. Price Waterhouse is the auditor of Tata Steel. Earlier this month, the RBI had barred S R Batliboi & Co, an arm of EY, from auditing the books of commercial banks for one year.

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