The Suburban Study Circle organized a meeting on the topic ‘Recent Amendments to Overseas Investment Regime in India’ on 15th October, 2022. CA Hardik Mehta made an insightful presentation and shared his views on the following topics:

• Enhanced clarity with respect to various definitions and routes for Overseas Investment.
• Introduction of the concept of ‘Strategic Sector’ and ‘Bonafide Business Activity’.
• Insights on further development in Round-tripping of Investments.
• Understanding of issuance of corporate guarantees to or on behalf of second or subsequent level step-down subsidiary (SDS) and deferred payment of consideration.
• Important changes in reporting requirements.
• Introduction of “Late Submission Fee (LSF)” for reporting delays.
• Other important amendments with relevant Posers/ Observations.

The HRD Committee Study Circle organized a meeting on the topic ‘Section 194 R – A 360-degree Perspective’ on 14th October, 2022. The session was led by CA Jhankhana Thakkar, who briefly took the members through the provisions of section 194R of the Income-tax Act, 1961 and two Circulars issued by the Central Board of Direct Taxes. She also took up some practical live case studies wherein she discussed the pros and cons of the applicability of section 194R. She also discussed applicability of section 194R to a commonly found situation i.e., where an employee of one Group company is deputed to another Group Company.

STUDY CIRCLE MEETING ON ‘LAW OF ATTRACTION’

In order to help members and their clients, the Accounting and Auditing Committee of the BCAS scheduled a comprehensive and interesting ‘360-degree online workshop’ spread over eight sessions over four days from 3rd, 7th, 8th and 10th September, 2022 on various important aspects dealing with audit of private limited companies and non-company entities (MSMEs). The workshop aimed at improving the overall quality of audit, avoid pitfalls and creating awareness of updated financial reporting framework, changed reporting and disclosure environment. The sessions were designed to be case study based and keeping in mind the practical challenges faced during audits. This all-round workshop was aimed at aiding the small and medium practitioner to sharpen their skills and update knowledge thus improving the overall quality of work and also help firms to prepare for peer review readiness and SQC compliance.

The workshop was designed specifically to cover practical aspects related to Standards on Auditng, Accounting Standards, CARO 2020, Amended Schedule III, provisions of Companies Act, Audit reporting etc.

Most of the speakers for this workshop were invited from the Accounting and Auditing Committee.

The HRD Committee study circle organized an online meeting on 23rd June, 2022 at the BCAS office. The meeting focused on the topic ‘Magic and Fundamentals of Homeopathy’. It was presented by CA Rajneesh Agarwal, a well-known professional, with deep interest in homoeopathy for over 25 years. He recently published a complimentary book “Homoeopathy: A Miracle of Nature” and has founded an organization “Kewal Samarpan Foundation”. His book is currently in English, Hindi and Bengali and can be downloaded from www.kewalsamarpan.com.

He has also made a home kit of 21 common homoeopathic medicines, with which the common man can cure numerous day-to-day ailments on one’s own at virtually no cost. He explained these 21 medicines and several ailments that can be easily cured by them.

At the meeting, he explained how Homoeopathy became his hobby and it helped him permanently cure his lifelong sinusitis, psoriasis, piles, etc. and how he has helped many people with magical results for strange afflictions.

He also explained how the molecular memory of natural substances is captured in alcohol, filtered, diluted and how these touch our energy, create waves in our energy field and result in activating our immunity and the disease being eliminated at the root.

YouTube Link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wPnF95Q-uM

LEADERSHIP WORKSHOP BY HRD COMMITTEE

The HRD Committee of the BCAS organised a five-hour leadership workshop entitled ‘Power of Attraction’ on 30th June and 1st July, 2022, in the virtual mode. The coach, Naz Chougley covered the extremely pertinent topics including how to manifest our dreams and aspirations and how to awaken the power to create reality through our thoughts.The coach guided the participants on the need to align with the Source (the highest version of ourselves), regain our worthiness, and feel unconditional love, deep acceptance and forgiveness for self. She dwelled on the importance of practicing gratitude and present moment awareness, leading a life of humility, releasing emotional blockages to heal both self and personal relationships.

Chougley spoke of how our habit of thinking is broadcast to the Universe – very often, we are habituated to create the ‘worst case scenario’ in our minds – this thought is captured by the Universe and is then manifested. Universe is a vibe of fun and joy, acceptance and awareness, and we need to consciously think of what is it that we want and invest time in this. We need to be aware of the frequency we are on – if we make it serious, that is how life will be. We are separate from our mind, and we need to question our beliefs, come out of our conditioning, and rewire our thinking.

She interspersed her talk with several real-life examples that her clients and she herself had experienced, and shared certain practices with the participants on how to maintain the positive vibration – (1) Five pills of gratitude every day thrice a day (2) Intention Tapping (3) Being in the present moment (4) Practicing emotional release.

The FEMA Study Circle organized three study circle meetings to take up the recently announced Overseas Investment Rules for detailed study and discussion. The first meeting, led by CA Hardik Mehta and CA Naisar Shah, focused on definitions and main concepts in the rules. The schedules to the Rules and important regulations as also the amendment made in the LRS Directions were taken up during the next two meetings by CA Harshal Bhuta and CA Sneh Bhuta. The group leaders brought out several nuances and issues by way of posers and case studies over these three meetings and those were deliberated upon by members of the Study Circle including Seniors in the profession.

MEETING ON TEACHINGS OF SAINT KABEER

The HRD Committee organized a Study Circle meeting to discuss the topic ‘Kabeer’s thoughts in 21st century: Relevance to our day to day life’ which was presented by Dr Hubnath Pandey, on 9th August, 2022 at BCAS office. The meeting was held in a hybrid format.

YouTube Link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5JrFb110vt0

SESSION ON DATA, CLOUDS AND NETWORK

The Technology Initiative Committee organized a session on ‘Data, Clouds, and Network – Best Practices’ on 2nd July, 2022 in hybrid mode at the BCAS Bhavan.The session was conducted by Mr. Deepak Jhaveri who has over 35 years of experience in advising clients in Information Technology (IT) infrastructure and security The session covered the following topics:

IT Security Awareness, Audit, External threats, and internal threats: The statistic of cyber-attacks and financial loss suffered by the organization was shared, and a quiz was conducted to identify fake website from the original one.

Self-Defence and Organization Defence: Areas of focus for defence from a technological perspective were discussed in detail. The speaker emphasized taking preventive measures while setting passwords, setting up a personal firewall or Wi-Fi, while navigating to social sites and using mobile devices in public places. He also explained about the alternative authentication methods.

IT Security Audit and Advisory Practice: The speaker covered the scope of IT security audit and advisory services and the growing market for such services.

Best Practices for Tools, Solutions, Cloud everywhere, Mobile Monsters: Best practices for using technology to ensure that it is not vulnerable to cyber-attacks and data leakages were discussed in detail. The speaker also presented a snapshot of various security products and applications relevant to address concerns of business.