SFIO investigating 127 companies for various violations

The Serious Fraud Investigation Office (SFIO) is probing as many as 127 companies for various violations, the government said today.
"As on November 30, 2015, investigations into the affairs of 127 companies were in progress with SFIO and investigation of one company has been stayed by court," Corporate Affairs Minister Arun Jaitley said in a written reply to the Lok Sabha.
In the current financial year till November-end, 35 firms were assigned to SFIO for investigation while the number in 2014-15 period stood at 71.
As many as 83 companies were assigned for probe in 2013-14.
During the last three years and current year till November 30, SFIO has been able to secure convictions in 16 cases through courts and Disciplinary Action Committees of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India, Jaitley said.

Noting that various measures have been taken to check cases of corporate frauds, Jaitley said to identify fraudulent activities at an early stage, the Market Research & Analysis Unit (MRAU) of the probe agency analysis information in public domain as well inputs received from other sources.
"Such alerts have necessarily to be corroborated through examination of books of account and other records by the field level office of the Ministry for detection or identification of fraud," he said.
About corrective measures to preclude recurrence of corporate frauds, Jaitley said there is increasing application of technology for early/preliminary identification of cases involving frauds through data analysis and usage of forensic tool, among others.