Mumbai, Dec. 28: PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) is facing a large exodus from its pool of tax experts led by Dinesh Kanabar, the head of its tax practice.

The large coven of tax experts — which includes 15 executive directors — is expected to join rival firm KPMG shortly.

“We can confirm that Dinesh Kanabar, executive director, PricewaterhouseCoopers, has resigned along with some tax executive directors,” PwC said in a statement today.

Audit and tax firms were abuzz with talk that the Satyam fiasco — which erupted in early January — had finally taken a toll on the firm and may have been responsible for the exodus. PwC was the auditor for the scam-tainted Satyam Computer Services.

However, Jairaj Purandare, PwC’s executive director, rubbished this rumour and said the decision of the tax experts had nothing to do with the Satyam episode.

“We have not lost a single client over the past one year in the tax practice and only three to four in the audit practice out of a few thousand clients,” Purandare told The Telegraph.

KPMG declined to confirm whether Kanabar and his colleagues would join the firm.

Sources, however, said Rajesh Dhume and Punit Shah were among those who had put in their papers at PwC or had initiated talks to quit the firm.

PwC is the leading tax firm in India with 55 executive directors and over 1200 tax professionals.

The firm said it had appointed Ketan Dalal and Shyamal Mukherjee as the new joint leaders for PwC’s tax and regulatory practice.

Rival firms are betting that the posse of executive directors who are expected to join KPMG will take away business worth at least Rs 100 crore from PwC.

“KPMG will be able to re-build its tax practice with this fresh infusion of talent practically overnight. This development will also narrow the lead that PwC has compared with other firms,” said an accounting professional who declined to be named.

Last year, senior tax professional Sudhir Kapadia, who was heading KPMG’s tax practice, moved to Ernst & Young. He was replaced by Uday Ved.

Purandare, however, said a few partners quitting the firm would not impact PwC’s business. “We are the largest firm, have extensive global linkages and offer services to a number of global clients who have a presence in India,” he added.

A professional from the industry said on condition of anonymity that most of the partners who had decided to quit PwC belong to the erstwhile RSM team.

“More resignations will follow. In fact, I believe that a term sheet was signed for 25 professionals,” he said.

This source pointed out that the ex-RSM team had faced integration issues in PwC. In 2007, RSM’s tax practice was merged with that of PwC. Purandare denied that this was the case.

Recently, there has been a change of guard at the top in PwC’s India operations. Ramesh Rajan stepped down as chairman and Gautam Banerjee took over the reins at the firm.