Satyam Computer Services Ltd

It's a classic rags to riches to rags story. The son of farmers leaves his village behind, moves up from textile mills to real estate to IT outsourcing for multinational firms. He emerges as one of India's wealthiest and most famous entrepreneurs -- until he reveals that his empire was floating on an accounting lie and it all comes crashing down. The U.S. has its Wall Street meltdown and the Bernard Madoff investment scandal.

Price Waterhouse, auditors of the troubled Indian outsourcing giant Satyam Computer Services Ltd., said Wednesday that its audit reports for the last eight years relied on potentially false data provided by the company and should be disregarded.