Singapore, India accounting bodies take ‘stepping stone’ towards mutual recognition of qualifications

[SINGAPORE] Singapore’s accounting body and its Indian counterpart are taking a step towards fuller mutual recognition of their professional qualifications, in a move that could make it significantly faster for Indian chartered accountants to obtain the Singapore qualification.

The Institute of Singapore Chartered Accountants (Isca) has approved a proposed module exemption agreement with the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI), alongside a separate collaboration aimed at extending Singapore-developed artificial intelligence training to the Indian body’s more than 1.5 million members and students.

Under the qualification arrangement, eligible ICAI members will be exempted from all six foundation-level modules of the Singapore Chartered Accountant Qualification (SCAQ), Isca said on Friday (Aug 21).

The SCAQ is Singapore’s national professional accountancy qualification leading to the Chartered Accountant of Singapore, or CA (Singapore), designation.

The qualification journey typically takes about three years, including the required relevant professional work experience.

The exemptions take effect from the same day, though the agreement has yet to be formally executed and remains subject to necessary approvals in India and other formalities.

Isca said the exemptions could shave as much as one-and-a-half years off the qualification journey, depending on how quickly candidates complete their remaining examinations and whether they have accumulated relevant work experience.

Speaking separately to The Business Times ahead of the signing on Friday, the presidents of both accounting bodies said the arrangement could pave the way for deeper recognition of their qualifications.

ICAI president Prasanna Kumar described it as a “stepping stone” towards a full-fledged mutual recognition agreement between the two professional bodies. Full mutual recognition is the longer-term goal, he said, and would require further steps involving the authorities.

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Without the exemptions, a fully qualified Indian chartered accountant seeking the Singapore qualification would have to start from the foundation level, Kumar added.

Isca president Lee Boon Teck said the two bodies were not setting targets for how many accountants would take up the pathway for now, preferring to establish the fundamentals before scaling up the collaboration.

The move is also part of Isca’s broader push to raise the international profile of the Singapore CA qualification.

India, as one of the world’s major economies, is an important part of that effort, Lee said. “When we said (that) we wanted to put ourselves on the world map, India had to be part of the equation,” he added.

Kumar said greater recognition could improve professional mobility for Indian accountants, with Singapore an attractive destination for employment and consultancy work.

The benefits could also flow in the other direction, he added, given the “significant” amount of Singapore investment in India.

Separately, Isca and ICAI signed a letter of cooperation setting out a framework for a proposed Global AI Fluency Initiative centred on Isca’s AI Fluency Programme.

The roughly 30-hour programme comprises 180 hands-on cases based on workplace applications, covering AI foundations, its use across accounting-related functions, and leadership and governance.

The two bodies will explore extending access to the programme to ICAI’s more than 1.5 million members and students, as well as sharing use cases and approaches to responsible AI adoption.

Kumar said ICAI has already trained about 55,000 Indian chartered accountants under the first two levels of its AI programme, and is starting a third level.

He said Isca was at a more advanced stage in terms of accountants adopting AI, and ICAI would study its curriculum to see what could be incorporated into its own programmes.