Human Resource Accounting Disclosure Practices In Indian Companies

Human resources with their innate pool of knowledge, skill, leadership, creativity and talent assist companies in achieving their goals. However, the current accounting system is not able to provide the value of human resources. We find human resource accounting (HRA) disclosures to be very low in Indian companies with only five companies reporting HRA in their annual report that is just 1 per cent of the sample set of companies. Furthermore, HRA disclosures that are made by companies are unstructured and inconsistent, and incomparable across companies and industries. Therefore, we examine the extent of HRA measurement and reporting practices of selected Indian companies among the National Stock Exchange S&P CNX 500 companies. We critically analyze these and rank the companies on the basis of the extent of disclosure of HRA information in annual reports of companies. Human Resource holds strategic position in the present era. The experience, knowledge and skills possessed by the employees are the real capital, especially for the knowledge based industry indeed banking industry. It is the main determinant for the productivity, profitability and sustainability, and forms basis for decision making to the investors all over the world. Disclosure of such an important element of the organization is important for information asymmetry. Considering the importance of Banking Industry in Indian economy and the importance of HR and HR Disclosure in this sector, the research paper aims to study present position of HR Disclosure Practices prevailing in Indian Banking Sector, and comparison of HR Disclosure Practices of Public, Private and Foreign Commercial Banks in India. It comprises study of 11 prominent commercial banks of India.