Ramalinga Raju

Internal auditor faces charges in Satyam scandal

Police reveal new charge sheet and extent of fraud at Indian computer giant

Written by Raghavendra Verma, in New Delhi

India's notorious Satyam Computer Services scandal has taken a turn for the worse, with the country’s Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) laying new charges against 10 defendants regarding fake invoices, inflated revenues, unauthorised loans and attempted cover ups.

These come in a new 200-page charge sheet with 1,549 additional documents and 301 additional witnesses, filed on November 25, before the city court in Hyderabad.

Advertisement

The CBI, (referring to the accused collectively in an official communiqué), has laid charges of creating fake invoices to inflate revenues by US$94 million and forging company board resolutions to obtain unauthorised loans worth US$265 million.

This followed the arrest on November 21 of the company’s former global head of internal audit V S Prabhakar Gupta, who has been charged with “willful suppression of auditing irregularities.” The accused include Satyam Computer Services ex-chairman Ramalinga Raju, former managing director Rama Raju, former chief financial officer Vadlamani Srinivas.

In the charge sheet CBI claims to have quantified the evidence about the wrongful gains made by the accused 10 and have identified 1,065 assets worth US$76 million acquired by them.

The investigative agency also claims to have collected more evidence against PricewaterhouseCoopers’ two auditors Subramani Gopalakrishnan and Talluri Srinivas, who have already been charged with ‘knowingly certifying forged and inflated balance sheets’. “Further evidence collected revealed the role of two statutory auditors in the fraud,” said the CBI communiqué.

Furthermore, the CBI said that it has in new evidence “brought out” the conspiracy amongst the accused to cover up the accounting scam in Satyam Computers through the acquisition of Maytas Properties – Raju’s family owned company – and in the process cheating the investors of other companies.

The first charge sheet was filed in March this year against nine accused of the company, now called ‘Mahindra Satyam’ after been sold to fellow IT services firm Tech Mahindra.

Commenting on the future course of action, the CBI official disclosed that it is contemplating to file more charge sheets pertaining to the diversion of funds and filing of income tax returns.

  • Have your say
  • Send to a friend
  • Share
  • Print

Comments

White papers

Related jobs

More Accounting jobs

Spotlight

Missing in action

The Stewardship Code aims to increase the engagement of institutional...

International rescue

The new chairman of the IASB’s trustees has set himself...

Audit: time for change

Since the financial crisis, calls have grown for an overhaul...

More finance jobs

Search thousands of finance jobs:

Find your next job

Hiring now on AccountancyAgeJobs.com:

Your next job

Related finance jobs

Search thousands of finance jobs:

Find your next job

Newsletters

Sign up here for the very latest news delivered to your inbox. Choose from the following options:

Newsletters

Have your say

Should accountants be afforded the same legal professional privilege as lawyers?
Yes
No

Advertisement

White papers

Improving cash flow and liquidity management

This paper discusses the challenges of keeping commercial cash flows healthy and improving liquidity management.

Walking the minefield of PCI DSS compliance
This paper presents a complete guide to PCI DSS, with a foreword from someone who really knows - the Payment Secuity Chief of Barclaycard, Neira Jones.

More white papers

Advertisement

White paper library

Keep up to date with the latest accountancy products, services and technologies from the world's leading IT companies; IThound.com brings you thousands of white papers, case studies and analyst reports.