The C&AG’s (Duties,
Powers and Conditions of Service) Act, 1971 under the Articles 148(3)
and 149 of the Constitution was passed by Parliament in 1971.
Mandate
for Accounts maintenance
Sections 10 to 12 of the Act ibid deal with the
responsibilities of C&AG in relation to Compilation of Accounts of
the Union, the States and Union territories with Legislatures.
Under the
provisions, the C&AG compiles the Accounts of the States, keeps such
accounts in relation to compiling of the Accounts of the States as
may be necessary and prepares Appropriation Accounts & Finance
Accounts every year.
The Appropriation &
Finance Accounts are signed by the C&AG of India and presented to the
Governor of the State for laying on the table of the State
Legislature.
Mandate for
Audit
Sections 13, 16 and
17 of the C&AG’s (DPCS) Act, 1971 define the duties of the
Comptroller & Auditor General in relation to the audit of the
accounts and the transactions relating to the Consolidated Fund,
Contingency Fund and the Public Accounts of the Union, the States and
Union Territories, C&AG is also responsible for the audit of Local
Bodies (i.e. Panchayati Raj Institutions and Urban Local Bodies)
under the provisions of some of the State Acts and provides technical
and administrative guidance for Accounting & Audit functions in all
States.
The reports of the
C&AG relating to the Accounts of the Union and the States are
submitted to the President/Governor of the State for being laid
before the Parliament/State Legislature. The C&AG is also responsible
for ensuring a uniform policy of accounting & audit in the Government
Sector as a whole. The Act authorizes C&AG to lay down for the
guidance of the Government Departments, the general principles of
Government accounting and the broad principles in regard to audit of
Receipt & Expenditure.
The mandate of C&AG
inter-alla includes audit of:
The audit mandate
also provides for the periodic inspection of records and accounts of
the Government departments to supplement the audit of vouchers and
sanctions that are with the accounts compiling offices.
Bifurcation of Indian Audit & Accounts Department
After the
departmentalization of Accounts of the Union Government in 1976, with
the primary purpose of developing an organizational pattern suited to
the changed environment of Audit and to improve maintenance of
Accounts of the State Government transactions, the Indian Audit &
Accounts Department was restructured in March 1984. It was considered
unlikely that a composite Accountant General’s office could develop
experts in such a vide garnut of functions involving totally
different areas as vide as Works Audit, Receipt Audit, Commercial
Audit, Establishment Audit, Accounts Compilation, Entitlement
Functions, Autonomous Bodies Audit etc. Thus, the composite offices
of the Accountants General were bifurcated into distinct offices with
separate cadres for dealing with (a) all audit work and (b) all
accounting & entitlement work. Accordingly, the offices of Accountant
General (Audit) Haryana and the Accountant General (A&E) Haryana came
into being with effect from 1.3.1984. |