The Satyam story is getting stale. With the way investigation is going with the slow Indian Judicial system, it will be long short until we see some justice done bringing all the culprits involved. Meanwhile, I took a wild shot at comparing Enron Scandal and Satyam Mammoth Scam to see whether its worth calling India's Enron.

ENRON Case Nov. 9: The company discloses that it overstated its earnings by $567 million since 1997. Two company officials are fired. Dec. 2: Enron, once one of the world's largest electricity and natural gas traders, files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

Sloppy board oversight, imaginative accounting, off-balance sheet financing, and a criminal CFO are some of the reasons which was by the media. But it is more of come to mind. But those are superficial, not decisive, at root more consequences than causes according to an analyst.

Enron did not fail because of creative bookkeeping, for instance, but was creative in bookkeeping because it was failing. Enron collapsed chiefly because its managers were paid to aim at the wrong financial measures, and consequently, its internal system of financial controls was a shambles.

SATYAM Saga On January 7, Ramalinga Raju tendered his resignation and confessed to a close to Rs 7,800-crore accounting fraud. The episode has international ramifications. Satyam serves as the back office for some of the largest banks, manufacturers, and healthcare and media companies in the world, handling everything from computer systems to customer service.

Shareholders have lost Rs 13,600 crore in Satyam shares in less than a month. The market capitalization fell to Rs 1,607.04 crore on January 9, 2008, from Rs 15,262 crore at the end of trade on December 16, 2008, the day when Satyam had announced the Rs-8,000 crore acquisition deal of two firms promoted by the kin of the IT firm’s former chairman Ramalinga Raju.

According to the recent New York Times report, “Investigators looking into the fraud have found a maze of about 300 companies related to Raju that were used to siphon as much as $1 billion in cash from Satyam. From the very latest investigation news from Andhra Pradesh police who has Raju(Satyam CEO) in custody revealed a more interesting tactic used to loot the money. Out of 53,000 employees, 10,000 employees were fake and money was laundered thru the fake 10,000 paychecks every month. Also they found some involvement by external accounting company which helped to route this looted money to the proper place.

It is the corruption and scamming mentality drove satyam scandal except the technique is different. It is the same old book keeping practice which allows lot of loops holes and tricks to be tried. Obviously we end up with a big question, how come Regulatory authorities, IT department, Banks didn't smell anything fishy and more importantly what happened to the Auditing process which is suppose to catch all the malpractices.

In conclusion, it is same spoiled pie but in different flavor. When these big money laundering outbreaks, it never fails to shock us with the magnitude of money and job losses. These days Corporate Scams have become part of technology revolution. Let's better get used to it, it is just the start.