Satyam`s Govt-named board, AP cops at variance on staff number

Hyderabad, Jan 25 (PTI) Satyam Computer's Government-
appointed board and India's southern state of Andhra Pradesh's
police are tugging at opposite ends of the rope on whether the
IT company's employee numbers were inflated.

"The board has confirmed that prima facie there appears
to be no basis to doubt the same," the six-member board said
snapping its fingers at the state Criminal Investigation
Department (CID) police's claim that Satyam founder Ramalinga
Raju had told them that employee numbers were inflated by over
12,000 in order to siphon off Rs 20 crore a month.

The company's Human Resource Department kicked off a
verification process, as the board said an independent probe
process is expected to reaffirm the head count in coming days.

"As of now, we believe there are 53,000 employees, which
is subject to verification and auditing," a Satyam
spokesperson said.

Public Prosecutor Ajay Kumar, on behalf of the CID, had
told a local court last week that Raju had said he had
inflated employee numbers so as to draw Rs 20 crore a month
from banks towards staff costs.

Raju, along with his brother Rama Raju and company's
former CFO Vadlamani Srinivas, is in judicial custody pending
investigation into a Rs 7,800-crore accounting fraud disclosed
by him on January 7.

The police Saturday arrested auditor Price Waterhouse's
partners S Gopalakrishnan and Srinivas Talluri in connection
with the case.

The divergent claims by the board and the police reflect
disunion among the different machineries of the government,
although the Andhra Pradesh has been maintaining that there is
coordinated action.

A central government probe team from the Serious Fraud
Investigation Office or the one from market regulator
Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) are yet to gain
access to Raju, much less question him. PTI