Schedule III

The part of India's Companies Act 2013 that prescribes the format of the balance sheet and the statement of profit and loss. Division I applies to companies on the older Indian GAAP, Division II to companies on Ind AS, and Division III to NBFCs on Ind AS.

It fixes the order and the names of the lines, so every Indian annual report reads alike. Non-current assets come before current assets and equity before liabilities, and the income statement runs from revenue from operations and other income down through expenses, exceptional items and tax to profit, other comprehensive income and total comprehensive income.

Two consequences matter for analysis. Expenses are shown by nature, such as materials consumed, employee benefits and finance costs, so gross profit has to be assembled by hand. And the 2021 amendments added disclosures worth reading every year: ageing schedules for receivables, payables and capital work in progress, changes in promoter shareholding and a table of key ratios with an explanation for any that moved by more than 25%.

Read that ratio table every year.