It all depends whether one prefers to work in Public Practice or in Industry after qualifying. If you like to work in industry then I think audit is the best.
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Tahoma, Arial" id="quote">quote<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Schuaeb</i>
<br />Some exposure in tax is also worthy. However, a student starting articles is seldom given option. More depends upon managements discretion
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I fully agree. If you enjoying managerial position in a company in finance department, you are expected to have working knowledge of tax as well.
In my opinion there is more exposure and greater opportunities of learning in Audit and as per as tax is concerned you can get a grip over it in two or three months. So you should chose audit rather than tax.
Having worked in both areas, I still am not able to conclude that how audit is much more diverse than tax. When why audit is always given that much importance over other areas as tax, corporate and management consultancy. For those who want to indulge in own practice the later are equally important.
In "ICAP Training Guidelines", it is clearly mentioned that trainee students should be given rotation in different departments/sections of their respective firms; in order to get a full-time exposure of all business/financial working areas. Allocated hours are also mentioned in those guidelines. Trainee students should have a complete exposure of the following areas to have a full understanding/grip of the profession;
But, it is a general trend in almost all of the CA firms that once a trainee student is inducted in any of the department/section of the firm, he spends almost all of his training span in that department/section. This thing is very commendable. In my opinion, CA firms should comply with this regulation of ICAP strictly. No doubt, 'Audit' is the main hallmark of our profession but it doesn't mean that other areas are unimportant for the trainee students. There is also an excellent learning in taxation, consultancy & other sections etc.