In which year was accounting separated from auditing and Comptroller and Auditor General's task only remained confined to auditing the Government Accounts ?

Question

UnlockIAS · Accepted Answer

Correct — C, 1976. Until the mid-1970s the Comptroller and Auditor General of India wore two hats at the Union level: he compiled and kept the accounts of the Central Government, and he also audited them — an arrangement long criticised because the same authority was both preparing and checking the same accounts. The reform, known as the departmentalisation of accounts, took effect in 1976: each Union ministry and department took over the compilation of its own accounts through its own Controller/Chief Controller of Accounts under the Ministry of Finance, and the CAG was relieved of the accounting function for the Union. From that point his Union-level role has been confined to audit. The legal vehicle was the CAG's (Duties, Powers and Conditions of Service) Act, 1971 — the statute enacted under Article 149 — as amended in 1976 to give effect to the separation. Note the limit of the change: it applied to the Union. The CAG continues to compile and keep the accounts of most State Governments, so the accounting side has not disappeared. (The title 'Comptroller and Auditor-General' is fixed by Article 148 and inherited from the British office — it is not a consequence of the State-accounts role) entirely.

Why the other options are wrong — (a) No change in the CAG's accounting responsibilities took effect in 1975. The year is memorable for the proclamation of the national Emergency in June 1975, and that fame is precisely what makes it a plausible-looking decoy in a list of mid-1970s dates.  (b) 1977 is a genuine landmark year in Indian administration — the change of government at the Centre, and the year the Prime Minister's Office came into existence in its present form — but the separation of accounts from audit had already taken effect the previous year, in 1976.  (d) Too late by half a decade. The departmentalisation of accounts was a 1976 measure carried out through an amendment to the CAG's (DPC) Act, 1971; nothing in 1981 altered the division between the CAG's audit function and the executive's accounting function.

Concept: The CAG is the constitutional guardian of the public purse, created by Article 148 and described by Dr Ambedkar as one of the most important officers under the Constitution. He is appointed by the President, holds office for six years or until the age of 65 whichever is earlier, and can be removed only in the manner and on the grounds applicable to a judge of the Supreme Court. Article 149 leaves his duties and powers to be prescribed by Parliament — hence the CAG's (Duties, Powers and Conditions of Service) Act, 1971 — and Article 151 requires his reports on Union and State accounts to be laid before Parliament and the State legislatures respectively. In Parliament those reports become the working material of the Public Accounts Committee, which examines them and reports back. V. Narahari Rao was independent India's first CAG.

State PCS 2019 Q139 — Polity & Governance PYQ with Answer

State PCS 2019 Q139 — Polity & Governance PYQ with Answer