Decision taken by ICAI Central Council after deliberations on the matter related to recent arrest of Chartered Accountants & other instances of ill- treatment of CAs by investigating authorities in Council Meeting held on 20th May 2022.
The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India
20th May 2022
The matter related to recent arrest of Chartered Accountants and other instances of ill- treatment of CAs by investigating authorities was discussed today in the Council of The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI).
The Council members expressed their strong resentment on the manner in which certain Investigating Officers are treating CAs and directly resorting to arrests. The Council was also apprised of the strong feelings of members throughout the country regarding ill-treatment being meted to certain members rather than taking strong action against the actual perpetrators.
The Council of ICAI resolved to form a Group comprising of its members to interface with authorities in order to ensure that just and fair treatment is meted out to Chartered Accountants and that they are not made soft targets.
CAs should accept the reality.
I have been in the Central Excise and GST dept since 1990 with 17 years as Inspr and 15 years as Supdt. Visiting faculty in National Academy of Customs and Indirect Taxes, Chennai, training institute of CBIC and handled more than 80 sessions on various topics of GST, C.Ex and S.Tax to Central GST and State GST Officers and Trade.
Maintaing All India WhatsApp group for CGST Officers for sharing knowledge on GST, besides having a WhatsApp group of SGST officers Tamilnadu.
In Central Excise there were no interference of CAs with the department.
It was maintained in Service Tax also barring few representations.I accepted CAs are masters in Income Tax related issues.
But in GST?
When GST was introduced w.e.f.01.07.2017 every CA started practicing the same thinking that a new tax regime is introduced.and all have to start afresh. But they failed to understand that GST is the mixture of C.Ex,S.Tax and VAT. So the experienced officers in the department are more familiar with understanding GST than CAs. Why CAs are not venturing much into Customs area disputes. Since GST is a best hunting area everyone started venturing into it taking advantage of online application and processing.
I have seen so many CAs misguiding the Tax Payer and finally approaching the departmental officers for seeking remedy.
While I do understand that sometimes hard treatment is meted out to the CAs, whom the investigating authorities arrest, I assume the main reason why they are arrested in the first place is that they have definite information that the CAs can shed more information on the shady deals which their clients perpetrate.
The prime reason why the CAs accept such high profile political clients is the lure of high fees and access to political connection.
So the risks of getting arrested goes hand in hand with the benefit of associating with such clients.
The CA profession should accept this reality.