VISAKHAPATNAM: GITAM University students will have a headstart over other business management students by gaining an accountancy qualification alongside their degree based on standards which India is set to embrace from 2015.
GITAM Institute of Management has signed an agreement with ACCA (the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants), which will enable students of the 3-year B.Com course to gain the internationally recognised ACCA qualification, and have a professional accountancy qualification.
The ACCA qualification, which is officially benchmarked as being equivalent to a UK Master’s Degree, was also the first to be based on the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) - the standards with which Indian accounting standards would be converging from 2015.
Inaugurating the programme Tuesday, Atracom (Ukraine company) chief financial officer Andrei Bovtik mentioned that the ACCA qualification allows Indian youth to work in global organisations, particularly in different financial areas because of the global nature of the qualification. Andrei observed that the
ACCA Education and Business Relationship manager Ilham Punjani said that the ACCA had 1,62,000 members and 4,32,000 students in 170 countries and carries over 100 years of experience in providing high standards of learning and development. A network of over 8,500 approved employers (including the big four - Deloitte, PwC, Ernst and Young and KPMG) support career opportunities for those who have qualified in ACCA, she added. Kunda Associates partner Sri Naga Lakshmi Kunda gave an account of her experiences after acquiring ACCA qualification.
GITAM Institute of Management principal K Sivarama Krishna said that students pursuing their B.Com degree with ACCA training would be eligible to get an additional degree of B.Sc in Applied Accounting from the world famous Oxford Brookes University, UK.