The efforts of the World Bank is nothing less than indirectly administering the country through the instruments including legal and policy measures along with their direct and indirect representatives in the helm of affairs of the governance in India.

The latest example is the so called plan of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG). CAG wants to move from cash to accrual basis accounting in government within a five year time frame.

A National Round Table Conference on Accrual Basis Accounting was held in CAG office yesterday i.e, May 5, 2009. The Conference, convened by Government Accounting Standards Advisory Board (GASAB) of CAG of India, deliberated the issue of migration from cash to accrual basis accounting and laid down the roadmap for migration process.

The question is if the event was a National Round Table Conference, what the World Bank officials were doing there?

It was the occasion that World Bank officials used in their way to interact with the Principal Secretaries from State Governments, officials from Department of Posts and Accountant General of various states.

It is obvious that the World Bank needs to have a close watch on the impact of their indirect governance in India including the expenditure part for which they have been giving huge amount of conditional loans and aids to various central and state governments and departments.

It was officially claimed that the accrual based financial statements are expected to provide more appropriate presentation of financial performance and position of the government. The Union and States would have a common format of financial statements that would include a Balance Sheet, a Statement of financial performance and a Cash flow statement.

The framework for the accrual accounting shall be Indian Government Financial Reporting Standards (IGFRS) issued by GASAB, it was said.

However, it may be mentioned here that IGFRS are harmonized with International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS), the international standards for governments, which has been propagated for quite some time by a certain international lobby having close links with the World Bank. This lobby is mainly interested in public sector.

Pilot studies are usually done in such cases. Department of Posts in Government of India and selected departments of Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Haryana and West Bengal have embarked on accelerated pilot studies on accrual basis accounting.

These pilot studies would be precursor to a national rollout which is aimed for within a five year time frame.

The pilot studies would be conducted by teams from the State Accountant General offices with international and national consultants with the support of state governments. The World Bank is funding these pilot studies.#