Context: Recently, the Ministry of Panchayati Raj has decided to conduct an online audit of 20 per cent of the estimated 2.5 lakh gram panchayats (GPs) across the country for the current financial year.
Key Points

• The audit will be scaled up to cover all Panchayats across the country in the next financial year 2020-21.
• The exercise will be conducted through AuditOnline, an application developed by the Ministry is a bid to ensure accountability in the utilisation of funds at the ground level.
• About 50,000 panchayats can be taken up for online audit during the current year.
• Their books of accounts for 2019-20 will be audited with a focus on how they used Finance Commission (FC) grants.

Significance

• The online audit will ease access to records, can be monitored at district, state and Centre level.
• Uploading photos of work done and geo-tagging projects will also allow for physical inspection.
• Online audit, with the option of physical verification, officials said, assumes greater relevance given the pandemic and the lockdown.
• An online audit can be monitored at all level: district-state-Centre.

About Audit Online

• It is an application developed as a part of Panchayat Enterprise Suite (PES) under e-panchayat Mission Mode Project (MMP) initiated by the Ministry of Panchayati Raj (MoPR).
• It facilitates the financial audit of accounts at all the three levels of Panchayats viz District, Block and Village Panchayats, Urban Local Bodies (ULB) and Line department by Auditors.
• It not only facilitates the online and offline audit of accounts but also serves the purpose of maintaining the past audit records of the auditee with associated list of the auditors and audit team involved in the audit.
• Also the information remains available in public domain and for usage by other PES applications.

Benefits of Online Audit

• Online audit with the option of physical verification assumes greater relevance given the pandemic and the lockdown.
• As some works (done under other schemes) are geo-tagged, auditors can do a sample check by visiting the site.
• Further, it ensures accountability in the utilisation of funds at the ground level.
• In the offline system, timely availability of records is a major issue. However, in the online system, the auditors will be able to see online all documents related to work approval and payments. They can even ask for additional documents such as photographs as a proof of work done.
• Moreover, an online audit can be monitored at all levels: district-state-centre.

Challenge

• More than 15% of Panchayats in several states have not completed their books of accounts for the year 2019-20.
• Completing and closing the accounts is a prerequisite for the online audit.
• While 100% of Panchayats in Maharashtra and Haryana have closed their 2019-20 accounts, no Panchayat has done this in Arunachal Pradesh and Bihar. States like Punjab and Himachal Pradesh are also low performers.