FrAudit

FRAudiT – Where the Numbers Never Lie, But People Do:

FRAudiT is the flagship auditing and forensic accounting competition at Strategia'27, designed to take participants beyond textbook learning and into the real-world workings of a statutory auditor and forensic investigator.

The competition challenges participants to work with incomplete information, conflicting evidence, time pressure, financial statement risks, internal control weaknesses, and fraud scenarios.

Across three progressively challenging stages, participants move from an online audit knowledge qualifier to an intensive forensic investigation and finally to a live "Cook & Catch" Showdown, where one team creates a realistic financial manipulation and another team must detect it.

Evaluation Criteria:

Participants will be evaluated on the following parameters:

• Accuracy and analytical reasoning
• Professional skepticism
• Financial statement analysis
• Quality of audit evidence and documentation
• Ability to identify fraud and control weaknesses
• Appropriateness of audit procedures
• Professional judgment and decision-making
• Teamwork under time pressure
• Clarity and professionalism of reporting

Guidelines:

• The competition is open to bona fide undergraduate, postgraduate, and professional-course students pursuing Commerce, Accountancy, Finance, and allied programs.
• Each team must consist of 2–3 members. Individual participation is not permitted at any stage.
• Team composition cannot be changed after the Round 1 registration deadline, except in documented emergencies and subject to approval by the Organizing Committee.
• Participants must carry valid institutional identification and may be required to produce it at any stage of the competition.
• Plagiarism, impersonation, misrepresentation, collusion, or any form of dishonest assistance is strictly prohibited.
• The use of AI tools, chatbots, automated reasoning assistants, internet access, or unauthorized reference material is prohibited unless specifically permitted for a particular round.
• Participants may communicate only with members of their own team during active competition windows.
• Only submissions made in the officially prescribed format will be evaluated.
• Once a submission has been made, it cannot be edited or resubmitted unless specifically permitted under the rules of that round.
• Any attempt to access confidential case content before the official commencement of a round may result in disqualification.
• Decisions of the judging panel and the Organizing Committee regarding scoring, rules, and disputes shall be final and binding.
• The Organizing Committee reserves the right to modify the format, schedule, scenario content, or rules wherever necessary. Any material changes will be communicated to participants.

Stages and Timelines:

Stage 1: Online Qualifier – Audit IQ: Concept and Case Challenge:

Date: To Be Announced (TBA)

Time: To Be Announced (TBA)

Duration: 30–45 minutes (TBA)

Platform: Online Examination Portal

The first stage is an online qualifier designed to test participants' understanding of auditing concepts and their ability to apply audit knowledge to practical business situations.

The qualifier combines conceptual auditing questions with short case studies and scenario-based questions. The focus is on application, reasoning, and professional judgment rather than simple memorization.

Part A – Audit Concepts:

Questions may cover the following areas:

• Fundamental and intermediate auditing concepts and principles
• Audit planning and risk assessment
• Internal controls and control risks
• Audit evidence and documentation
• Audit procedures and assertions
• Materiality and professional skepticism
• Fraud risk
• Ethics and auditor independence
• Substantive testing, vouching, and verification
• Analytical procedures
• Revenue, inventory, receivables, and payables
• Basic forensic audit awareness

Part B – Audit Case Studies:

Teams will encounter practical audit scenarios involving:

• Financial statement risks
• Internal control weaknesses
• Fraud risks
• Audit evidence and documentation
• Revenue, inventory, receivables, purchases, and payroll
• Selection of appropriate audit procedures
• Identification of appropriate auditor responses

Question Pattern and Selection:

• Approximately 40–50 objective questions are expected.
• Around 60% of the questions will be conceptual or application-based.
• Around 40% will be case-study or scenario-based.
• The difficulty level will progress from basic and intermediate concepts to application-based questions and challenging professional judgment scenarios.
• The round will be strictly time-bound. The online portal will automatically submit responses when the allotted time expires.

Qualification Criteria: The top 50 teams will qualify for Stage 2.

Stage 2: The Red Flag Files – Forensic Investigation Round:

Date: 15th February, 2026

Format: Offline / In-Person Investigation Round

Duration: 60 minutes

The Red Flag Files is the centrepiece of the FRAudiT forensic investigation experience.

Teams will receive a sealed Audit File containing a realistic collection of business documents and must investigate the records to uncover interconnected fraud schemes.

Rather than simply identifying an isolated error, participants must connect the dots across multiple documents and build an evidence trail demonstrating how the records relate to a potential fraud.

The Audit File:

The file may contain documents such as:

• Purchase Orders
• Tax Invoices
• GST Returns
• Salary Registers
• Bank Statements
• Ledger Extracts
• Inventory Records
• Vendor Master
• Email Communications
• Delivery Challans
• Payment Vouchers
• Journal Entries
• Fixed Asset Register
• Audit Trail
• Cash Book
• Trial Balance

Investigation Tasks:

Teams will be required to:

• Cross-reference multiple documents to trace transactions.
• Identify numerical, date, and authorization inconsistencies.
• Detect suspicious transactions and potential fraud schemes.
• Build an evidence trail connecting anomalies to the suspected fraud.
• Explain why each identified item is suspicious.
• Recommend appropriate audit procedures, such as vouching, confirmation, and physical verification.
• Prepare a structured Audit Observation Sheet documenting their findings.

The round is designed to replicate the working environment of a forensic audit engagement, where fraud is rarely contained within a single document and must instead be established through corroborating evidence.

Evaluation Criteria:

Teams will be evaluated on:

• Red Flag Identification
• Cross-Referencing Quality
• Reasoning and Explanation
• Recommended Audit Procedures
• Presentation and Documentation

Qualification Criteria: The top 10 teams will advance to the Grand Finale.

Stage 3: Grand Finale – Crooked Books: The Cook & Catch Finale:

Date: 15th February, 2026

Format: Live Two-Phase Forensic Simulation

The Grand Finale transforms participants from investigators into both fraud creators and auditors, challenging them to understand not only how financial manipulation occurs but also how it can be detected.

The top 10 teams will be divided into two groups:

• Group A – Fraud Accountants
• Group B – Auditors

Teams will be paired head-to-head, with each pair receiving the same business scenario.

Phase 1 – The Cook:

Role: Fraud Accountants

Duration: 90 minutes

The Fraud Accountant teams will receive a genuine and internally consistent set of books and will have 90 minutes to introduce deliberate financial manipulation.

Possible manipulation techniques include:

• Window dressing of financial statements
• Revenue manipulation or premature revenue recognition
• Fictitious or inflated expenses
• Inventory inflation
• Fake or shell vendors
• Payroll manipulation
• Unsupported or backdated journal entries
• Concealment of liabilities
• Artificial profit creation

The objective is not simply to falsify numbers but to construct a fraud scenario that appears believable, remains internally consistent, and is difficult to detect.

At the end of this phase, teams must submit their manipulated books and supporting fabricated documentation in a sealed and anonymized format.

Phase 2 – The Catch:

Role: Auditors

Duration: 90 minutes

The paired Auditor teams will receive the anonymized manipulated books and conduct a simulated audit investigation to uncover the financial manipulation.

Teams will be required to:

• Investigate the records using audit techniques such as vouching, verification, analytical review, and ratio analysis.
• Detect fraudulent activities.
• Gather and document supporting evidence.
• Prepare a structured Audit Observation Sheet.
• Recommend further audit procedures.
• Quantify the financial impact of identified frauds wherever possible.
• Recommend corrective actions and internal control improvements.

Evaluation Criteria:

Fraud Accountant Teams will be evaluated on:

• Creativity
• Realism
• Complexity
• Ability to Conceal
• Consistency
• Documentation Quality

Auditor Teams will be evaluated on:

• Detection Accuracy
• Investigation Quality
• Audit Approach
• Evidence Collection
• Professional Skepticism
• Reporting Quality
• Root Cause Analysis

Final Results:

- At the conclusion of the Grand Finale, the strongest performances across the head-to-head matchups will be considered to determine the final Winner, Runner-Up, and Third Place.

The FRAudiT Experience:

• FRAudiT is more than an auditing competition. It is a test of analytical thinking, professional skepticism, investigative ability, and the judgment required to distinguish credible financial reporting from deliberate manipulation.
• From identifying risks in an online qualifier to tracing fraud through complex audit files and finally creating or uncovering manipulated financial statements, every stage challenges participants to think like real-world professionals.

FRAudiT – Where the Numbers Never Lie, But People Do.