Union Minister for Finance & Corporate Affairs Smt. Nirmala Sitharaman here today virtually launched Central Scrutiny Centre (CSC) and Investor Education and Protection Fund Authority’s (IEPFA) Mobile App - two tech-enabled initiatives by Ministry of Corporate Affairs. These initiatives leverage to strengthen the Prime Minister’s vision of ‘Digitally empowered India’. Shri Rajesh Verma, Secretary, MCA, and other senior officials attended the virtual launch event.

Announcing the launch of new initiatives, Smt. Sitharaman said, “Digital India is a campaign launched by the Government of India in order to ensure that the Government's services are made available to citizens electronically by making the country digitally empowered in the field of technology. These two initiatives would create a new corporate and investor friendly ecosystem. Going forward, MCA would bring in more tech-enabled services for ease of doing business and ease of living for the people.”

The Finance Minister also said that the Ministry of Corporate affairs has been engaged in a continuous journey of digitisation, automation and improvement, for the good of the society, the corporates, the economy and the professionals.

Smt. Sitharaman further added that the multiple initiatives taken by the MCA in past couple of years to promote Ease of Doing Business (EoDB) in India. The increase in number of incorporation of Companies in India even during the COVID-19 pandemic is the result of initiatives like introduction of integrated form SPICe+ & Agile Pro for incorporation of Companies, which has provided one stop solutions to promoters desirous of setting up a business entity in India.

This year till February 2021, about 1.38 lakhs companies have been incorporated as compared to about 1.16 lakhs companies in the corresponding period of last year by Central Registration Centre, an increase of over 17%, Smt. Sitharaman added.

The Finance Minister said that the Central Scrutiny Centre will scrutinize certain Straight Through Process (STP) Forms filed by the corporates on the MCA21 registry and flag the companies for more in-depth scrutiny.

Smt. Sitharaman stated that MCA being one of the key primary sources of corporate data, is required to ensure that the data quality is uncompromised and free from flaws. With this objective in mind, the Ministry of Corporate affairs has established a Central Scrutiny Centre, which will primarily scrutinise the filings made by the users under straight through processes, identify the data quality issues and irregularities, communicate the same to the concerned Registrar of Companies so that corrective steps can be taken to restore authenticity and correctness of data and it can be seamless shared with other regulators, if required.

The Finance Minister also launched the IEPFA Mobile App. During the launch the Finance Minister said, “The Mobile App aims at achieving the goal of financial literacy, spreading investors’ awareness, education, and protection among investors. Our prime goal here is to push Ease of Living.”

Smt. Sitharaman added that the Mobile App has been developed for citizen engagement and information dissemination to promote awareness among investors. With this App, the Authority aims to achieve the goal of financial literacy, spreading investors’ awareness, education, and protection among investors both in rural and urban areas.

Considering the dynamic nature of corporate compliance and regulatory ecosystem, the MCA will continue to upgrade the sampling mechanism, process workflow and technology to address the needs of stakeholders and promote EoDB in India, the Finance Minister said.

The IEPFA App will have the facility of tracking the status and progress of the IEPF claim refund process. Moreover, it also provides a mechanism for investors and common citizens to report on the suspected fraudulent schemes.  Currently, the app is available on Android based devises and can be downloaded from Play Store.

Corporate data scrutiny using a centralised screening mechanism to detect STP filing defects and protect investor interests. The Central Scrutiny Centre will screen Straight Through Process (STP) filings on the MCA21 registry to detect data quality issues and irregularities, flag companies for further scrutiny, and notify the concerned Registrar of Companies to restore data authenticity and enable sharing with other regulators. The IEPFA Mobile App provides investor education, refund-claim tracking and a mechanism to report suspected fraudulent schemes, supporting outreach and protection objectives.