Law graduation and Company Secretary

1. Compliance officer: A company secretary is the primary compliance officer of the company. He is the person or his department is responsible to see that the company is running legally without violating the rules of the land.

2. Advisory to the Board A company secretary is the primary advisor to the board of directors of a company. As most of the directors are business men or having business presence in different domains, they always look for expert advice on every corporate actions and decisions, and the first person who can help them in the top management is none other than the company secretary.

3. Secretarial Audit By the Companies Act 2013, it has become a the duty of a company secretary to conduct secretarial audit in a company, to ensure proper compliance of law in every corporate decision and action.

4. Intermediary between the company and employees, company and public, company and governments, company and investors and company and the outside world. A company secretary in most of the situation regarded as the chief information officer of the company on matters related to corporate compliance.

5. Legal officer of the company Company secretary keeps all legal records of a company to  ensure that the compliances are not challenged in future also.

6. Properly conducting corporate meetings.

7. Compliance officer for corporate governance and CSR activities.

8. Responsible to keep all statutory registers as per the provisions of law.

9.Representing company in several legal forums.

10. Responsible to provide replies on questions of legal compliances. It is to be noted that the role of company secretary is not fixed on one domain and it changes according to companies and situations. Now the good question usually asked in the career guidance classes, whether I should be a law graduate to become a company secretary. No it is not necessary for a company secretary to be a law graduate. Most of the duties and responsibilities of a company secretary is mostly legal in nature. Company secretary is regarded as a specialist in corporate law. So if a company secretary is also a law graduate it will be a great advantage for presenting and defending the company in various forums. In job market, a law graduation for a company secretary is an added advantage. Now if a law graduate acquires CS, he can be a specialist in corporate law and practice as a specialist. The opportunities for such a specialist is enormous as the number of companies are growing day by day and laws are changing frequently. To conclude we can clearly say that having a law degree for a CS or vice versa, will give the professional an added advantage in the corporate career or practice.