'Chartered accountants safe from meltdown'

CHANDIGARH: At a time of pink slips, salary cuts and global economic gloom, what is the best job to have? Be a chartered accountant, that's what

a top group of accountants says.

"There is no impact of recession on Indian chartered accountants (CAs) because no company can manage without them. Moreover there not even a drop in their salary packages," Uttam Prakash Agarwal, president of Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI), said here on Saturday.

"In fact the newly recruited young CAs are able to get salary package of anywhere above Rs.6 lakh (Rs. 600,000), depending on their training and quality. At this point of time, both demand and salaries of CAs are increasing at very encouraging pace," Agarwal said on the sidelines of a two-day national conference of chartered accountants here.