ASI says no to Actuaries Bill

Chennai: Even as the 'standing committee on finance' is examining the Actuaries Bill 2005, the Actuarial Society of India (ASI) says such a statue would not add any value to the profession. The bill was introduced in the Parliament, which referred it to the standing committee.

The bill proposes to confer on ASI, a chartered status and is modelled along the lines of governing statues of accounting institutes like chartered and cost accountancy and company secretaries.

The conversion of ASI into a chartered institute has its roots in the 'Malhotra committee' report. The committee recommended that the insurance industry should fund ASI while the government should consider according it a statutory status. The work on the bill started in 1996 and has now reached the Parliament.

According to Liyaquat Khan, president, ASI's, one of the provisions in the bill stipulates that the proposed institute would have three central government nominees and one from the IRDA on its governing council. This when there will be no government funding for the proposed institute.

Running a rapidly developing profession by a governing body as mentioned in the bill will not be effective and will go against the profession." Khan strongly feels that the current structure is robust enough to take the profession forward.

He adds, "The ASI has gained enough experience in running and expanding the institute's activities under the current structure. The institute works in close coordination with IRDA and global actuarial bodies like the International Actuarial Association (IAA). The latter feels that actuarial bodies are best governed if organised under self regulatory and non governmental structure but under overall guidance of the stakeholders and the sector regulator."