The Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA) has decided to appoint a consultant to monitor the central record keeping agency, NSDL, as part of its efforts to increase scrutiny of intermediaries in a fast-growing sector.
With a rise in grievances over high charges imposed by NSDL, plans are afoot to appoint multiple CRAs for NPS in future to bring down costs for investors. To facilitate this process, the PFRDA would appoint a project management consultant who will be responsible for helping the regulator in improving operations such as portability of permanent retirement account number (PRAN) of subscribers, framing the IT infrastructure, audit of operations and arbitration and dispute resolution mechanism.
“PFRDA’s staff strength is about 50. While the regulator’s primary job is framing regulation, it needs a monitoring agency to look into various operational aspects,” an official told FE.
Last year, the PFRDA appointed Crisil to monitor the performance of fund managers. Now it has invited bids by May 6 for the management consultant’s job.
PFRDA’s bid document says the incumbent company must have on its rolls consulting staff of at least 100 technically qualified personnel in the area of consulting services for IT related projects such as e-governance, program or project management, IT infrastructure, IT security and IT procurement.
The company should also have been in the consulting business in the government domain in the last 3 years and have experience in working with the financial services sector.
PFRDA sources said management consultancy firms such as Deloitte, E&Y, Pricewaterhouse, KPMG as well as IT majors like TCS, Infosys and Wipro may be eligible for applying for the coveted post.
