State Bank of India's decision to appoint a single auditing firm for tax audit has been opposed by The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI).

ICAI has opposed the idea on grounds that it would affect the bank's quality of audit as compared to the present practice wherein the bank does work by multiple firms.

The ICAI had earlier raised this issue with the top management of SBI. Failing to get a suitable response, it has now decided to go to the Reserve Bank of India. ICAI fears that SBI's move may be followed by other banks which may lead to serious delinquencies in the auditing system.

"We will intensify our efforts to stop SBI from going ahead on the matter," said Pankaj Jain, member ICAI council.

Tax audit, is currently done by statutory auditors of banks. The largest lender of the country, SBI currently has around 3,000 branch auditors and 14 statutory auditors.

"In the Indian context, the work done by large number of firms has stood the test of time compared to other prevalent international practices," the ICAI said in its letter to SBI Chairman OP Bhatt.