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| Bharti retains the floor price of Rs 45 share as issue price NEW DELHI, Feb 3: Bharti today announced retention of floor price of Rs 45 a share as the final price for ....more Bush wants
120 billion WASHINGTON, Feb 3: In the biggest US military buildup in two decades, President George W Bush will.....more Britain’s
Prince Charles LONDON, Feb 3: Britain’s Prince Charles accepted one million pounds (1.4 million dollars) from the col...more As
protesters gather, NEW YORK, Feb 3: Global leaders at the World Economic Forum urged rich nations to end their.....more |
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Efforts on to bridge fiscal gap: Sinha NEW YORK, Feb 3: Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha has said that efforts are being made to close the fiscal......more Dip in
fuel prices makes NEW DELHI, Feb 3: Sharp fall in the price of petrol, diesel oil, naptha and kerosene sent commodity prices .......more Indian
liquor MUMBAI, Feb 3: The Indian liquor industry has demanded a level playing field in the post World Trade .....more Pak says
poised to gain NEW YORK, Feb 3: Pakistan, whose economy has already recovered after initially being hurt by the Afghan....more |
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Bharti retains the floor price of Rs 45 share as issue price NEW DELHI, Feb 3: Bharti today announced retention of floor price of Rs 45 a share as the final price for its 2.5 times oversubscribed public issue of 18.5 crore shares mopping up Rs 833.85 crore from the capital market. "After final allocation of the shares, the foreign ownership of the company has gone upto 46.7 per cent leaving a gap of another 2.3 per cent for secondary market trading," Bharti said. The demand was built at higher than the floor price of Rs 45 per share largely between Rs 46-48 per share, company statement said adding "the company in the interest of all the investors has decided to fix the issue price at Rs 45 a share in consultation with the book running lead managers, JM Morgan Stanley and DSP Merrill Lynch." The total demand for Bharti Televentures, service arm of Bharti Group, at Rs 47 per share was at 25.91 crore shares, while the demand at Rs 46 per share was 39.88 crore shares against an issue size of 18.53 crore shares. The issue received more than 25,000 applications. (PTI) |
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Bush wants 120 billion dollars
defense boost WASHINGTON, Feb 3: In the biggest US military buildup in two decades, President George W Bush will press Congress on Monday to raise defense spending by 120 billion dollars over the next five years to 451 billion dollars by 2007, senior US officials said. Proposed increases over the current 331 billion dollars Pentagon budget would begin with a jump to 379 billion dollars in the coming 2003 financial year beginning next Oct. 1 and steadily rise in the following four years, the officials said. Next year’s defense increase would be part of Bush’s proposed 2.1 trillion dollars overall federal budget for 2003. "The budget for 2003 is much more than a tabulation of numbers. It is a plan to fight a war we did not seek, but a war we are determined to win," Bush will say in his budget proposal, according to excerpts obtained by a news agency. "America’s military must be strengthened ... So it can act still more effectively to find, pursue, and destroy our enemies." Officials, who asked not to be identified, said they expected lawmakers to approve next year’s 12 percent budget increase despite major controversy over Bush’s costly plan to build a missile defense system for the United States. "I think it would be hard to dismiss a very large increase after September," said one of the officials referring to the devastating Sept. 11 attacks on America, which Washington blames on the Al Qaeda network of Osama bin Laden. Bush has already announced he plans to call for an increase to 379 billion dollars for next year to arm and prepare the US military for war against both "terrorist" groups and nations in the years ahead. The US-led war in Afghanistan, which has toppled that country’s ruling hard-line Islamist Taliban movement and battered the Afghan-based Al Qaeda, is already costing Washington more than 1 billion dollars a month. Next year’s proposed defense spending increase of 12 per cent after allowing for inflation would be the biggest percentage boost in the military budget since then-President Ronald Reagan began a five-year arms build-up 21 years ago that left the Soviet Union broken. Bush and members of Congress have agreed that the world’s only superpower military must gird with new arms, technologies and strategies to fight groups such as the anti-western Al Qaeda network, blamed by Washington for the attacks that killed more than 3,000 people in Washington and New York. The New York Times first reported the new five-year budget projection figures yesterday, quoting congressional and defense industry officials. Much of the 2003 defense budget to be sent to the legislature on Monday would cover better troop pay and benefits. But officials said it would also devote 29 billion dollars to the war on terrorism and 9 billion dollars to unconventional arms ranging from pilotless spy planes carrying missiles to a laser communications system for troops. The budget would resupply the air force with thousands of satellite-guided bombs used in Afghanistan and convert four big cold war submarines built to fire long-range nuclear missiles to instead launch dozens of conventional cruise missiles. Bush’s plan reflected Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s call this week for more spending on high-tech weapons and innovative post-cold war strategy to protect the nation from "the unknown, the uncertain, the unseen and the unexpected." Bush’s budget includes 7.8 billion dollars for missile defense, a figure unchanged from the current year. But critics of the testing program to shoot down missiles from "rogue" states are concerned over a congressional budget office estimate this week that it could cost 238 billion over the next 15-25 years. (AGENCIES) |
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Britain’s Prince Charles linked to Enron Executives LONDON, Feb 3: Britain’s Prince Charles accepted one million pounds (1.4 million dollars) from the collapsed energy giant Enron for his youth charity, a spokeswoman for the Prince said. The heir to the British throne also dined with senior Enron Executives and may have met company boss Kenneth Lay. "The Prince did meet Enron representatives in Houston in 1993," a spokeswoman for Prince Charles told newsmen yesterday. "I can’t confirm it was Kenneth Lay but it’s extremely likely that he was among them along with other senior corporate donors in Houston," she said. She was unable to confirm media reports that the prince had visited lay’s home. The Texas-based energy company was by then an established donor to Prince Charles’s charity for young people, the Prince’s Trust. "The first donation came in 1991, when contact was initially made with Enron and that was a 500,000 (pounds) donation which covered a five-year period," a spokeswoman for the trust told newsmen. "A second donation of 300,000 (pounds) came in around 1996 to cover the three years through to 1999, specifically for a European work away programme," she said. The programme which enron helped fund was designed to allow young people from disadvantaged backgrounds, often long term unemployed or ex-offenders, to gain life skills by working on community projects in Europe. Media reports said that Enron Executives were invited to functions at the Prince’s London Residence, St James’s Palace. Neither the Prince’s trust nor Prince Charles’s spokeswoman could confirm such visits but both said it was likely they had taken place. "We have a large number of corporate donors and corporate social responsibility is increasingly an area that companies are concerned with," the Trust’s spokeswoman told newsmen. "We work with a vast number of organisations and invite them to events where they’d meet people who’d gone on the programmes and benefited from them, anything from awards ceremonies, or on occasion one of our premieres," she said. (AGENCIES) |
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As protesters gather, leaders focus on aid NEW YORK, Feb 3: Global leaders at the World Economic Forum urged rich nations to end their "selfish" ways and offer poor countries a better path to prosperity as thousands protested in the streets against corporate greed. The business and political elite — from Microsoft Corp. Co-founder Bill Gates and International Monetary Fund chief Horst Koehler to rock Icon Bono — chided the industrialized nations for being reluctant to address inequality, debt relief and health issues. "Societies in the advanced countries are too selfish to give up privileges which are needed in order to give the poor a better chance," Koehler told a panel on the global economic outlook yesterday. Outside the posh Manhattan hotel where 2,700 delegates were gathered for the third of the five-day conference, more than 5,000 raucous anti-globalization protesters were kept at Bay by Phalanxes of Police in riot gear. Kate Farmer, 53, a research scientist from Northampton, Mass, carried a sewing machine with a sign saying: "22 cents an hour in Lesotho, Africa, sewing clothes for you." "There are people now in Lesotho being abused working in Taiwanese sweatshops in Lesotho to make clothes for the gap, Wal-mart and K-mart," she said. The world’s richest man, multi-billionaire gates argued for more investment in health issue to assist poor countries to grow. To that end, he said his foundation was donating 50 million toward HIV and AIDS prevention. "The health agenda is inarguable," said Bono, who shared a stage with gates. "If you are to get out of the morass of living off the nipple of aid, you have to have health." There was sterner sentiment from US Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill, who defended US reluctance to substantially increase foreign development aid, saying it was more productive to help poor countries better manage the aid they now receive. The point, he said, was to make developing countries "engines of economic growth ... And not just the objects of our pity." World Trade Organization chief Mike Moore, however, said wealthy nations must open their markets and address the inequity of protectionism. The new Doha round of global trade talks would fail poor countries without more access for their agricultural exports, he said. "Criticisms about how the markets of the north are closed are totally correct," Moore told a news conference. "It is an injustice that has to be addressed." Both the IMF and the WTO are popular targets for anti-globalization demonstrators, who say they enable rich countries and multinational corporations to ride roughshod over developing countries. Although thousands rallied against the forum, the mood was both festive and defiant. A giant papier-mache vulture bore the letters "WEF" on its breast while a large canvas dragon on poles read "the WEF is dragon us down." There were only nine arrests reported, unlike the violence at the group of seven meeting last year in Genoa, Italy and riots in Seattle in 1999. The protesters in New York echoed themes being discussed at the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil, where participants put forth a vision of a world without third world debt. "The roads toward resolving our foreign debt problems are the roads of freedom for our countries," Argentine nobel laureate Adolfo Perez Esquivel said at the second day of the event — the activist world’s answer to the WEF. With the destruction of the world trade towers by airplane attacks on Sept. 11 as a backdrop, how to address inequality that can lead to violence was high on the agenda at this year’s annual gathering of rich and powerful. French Finance Minister Laurent Fabius said the world could not expect to wage the fight without a parallel battle to snuff out the poverty that breeds resentment at world powers. "If we want to get rid of terrorism, there is not only a war in terms of military action, but there is a necessity of war in terms of helping poor countries to develop," he said. US Sen. Patrick Leahy, a Vermont Democrat, added: "We can spend hundreds of millions putting a country back together again after we have gone to war. Why don’t we spend some of that to prevent them from going to war in the first place?" India’s Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha had suggestions on how that can be done, saying rich countries must stop coming up with "new and inventive" ways to block access to their markets and allow poor countries to develop their export industries. The IMF’s Koehler scolded the United States and Europe for lacking the will to halt subsidies that protect domestic farmers and to give poor countries access to agricultural markets. "The US is also a sinner," he said. "And certainly we also need to see a breaking up in agricultural policy in Europe." (AGENCIES) |
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Efforts on to bridge fiscal gap: Sinha NEW YORK, Feb 3: Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha has said that efforts are being made to close the fiscal gap through cuts in unproductive expenditures and increase in revenue collection. "Fiscal deficit continues to be a problem. The Government is adopting a number of measures like higher revenue collection to contain it," he told a news conference here yesterday. Asked at the conference, held at the Consulate General of India, to elaborate on the measures, Mr Sinha said they would be unveiled in the new budget, the minister’s fifth, to be presented later this month. The country’s chronic fiscal deficit — budget deficit plus Government borrowing — rose to 5.2 per cent of gross domestic product in the fiscal year 2000-01 mainly due to lower-than-expected tax revenues. The Centre set a target of 4.7 per cent of GDP for the current fiscal but experts are of the view that it might not be met because of domestic slowdown and the prevailing recession in major economies, he said. New Delhi has never defaulted in its foreign obligations, including NRI deposits, the minister pointed out. On globalisation, he said India has always been of the view that its benefits should reach the people at the lowest rung of the economic ladder. The Finance Minister spoke at the conference mostly in English, though he answered a few questions in Hindi. To a query, Mr Sinha said that national security was paramount and no effort would be spared to meet any challenges. Answering another, he noted, "a stable Afghanistan is important for India." He said it would be beneficial for both India and the United States if Washington lifted restrictive trade practices against Indian steel. A delegation from New Delhi visited the US capital recently in this regard. He made it clear that the economic reforms, being pursued since mid-1991, were irreversible at the centre, in states as well as in the union territories. On the currency movement, Sinha said, "the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is monitoring on a daily basis the undue volatility of the rupee." On Wednesday, the rupee fell to a historic low against the dollar. It dived to 48.62 a dollar in morning deals, compared to its previous lifetime low of 48.43 that it hit on September 17. The currency closed at a new low of 48.50-52 on Wednesday. Addressing an Asia Society-Confederation of Indian Industry meeting, the minister, in New York to attend the ongoing World Economic Forum conference, said greater attention would be paid to the power sector in the second wave of reforms being launched soon. He told the Friday meeting, titled ‘Second wave of economic reforms in India: Outlook for 2002, that a fiscal responsibility law would be enacted to meet the targeted deficit figure each year. Sinha was happy that much had been achieved in the first set of reforms, which ended with the institution of mechanisms like the ones in insurance and telecommunications sectors. The minister assured the gathering that despite enhanced privatisation on several fronts, the Government would supervise functioning of various entities through regulatory mechanisms. He pointed out that one of the focus areas during the second wave would be human resources development. (UNI) |
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Dip in fuel prices makes inflation touch 1.32 pc NEW DELHI, Feb 3: Sharp fall in the price of petrol, diesel oil, naptha and kerosene sent commodity prices plummeting to more than two decades low of 1.32 per cent for the week ended January 19, as against 8.7 per cent in the corresponding period of previous year. The change in prices as measured by Wholesale Price Index (WPI) was down by 0.25 per cent from the previous week’s level of 1.57 per cent, despite costlier minerals, mutton, poultry, fish-marine, bus chasis and body manufactured for trucks and vans. Following the footsteps of point-to-point inflation, WPI fell by 0.4 per cent to 160.7 for the latest reported week as against 161.3 in the previous week and the index was 158.6 a year ago. The final WPI was marginally higher at 162.1 for the week ended November 24, 2001 than the provisional level of 162. The final inflation for the third week of November last year was 2.47 per cent as compared to the provisional figure of 2.40 per cent. The Consumer Price Index for Industrial Workers (CPI-IW) fell by three points to 469 in December 2001 from the previous month. But the point-to-point inflation based on CPI-IW rose to 5.16 per cent in December, 2001. The 12-month moving average of CPI-IW rose to 457.67 in December, 2001 from 455.75, entitling the Central and State Government employees to four per cent additional Dearness Allowance (DA) from January 1, 2002. Interestingly, all the commodity groups— primary, fuel and manufactured articles— became cheaper in the second week of January this year. The index for primary articles’ group fell marginally by 0.2 per cent to 166.2 from 166.5 in the previous week, even as food articles and minerals became costlier. The index was 161.4 in the previous year. Food articles’ group index rose by 0.1 per cent to 174.5 from 174.3 due to higher prices for mutton and poultry chicken (two per cent each) and moong and fish-marine (one per cent each), even as prices fell for arhar and tea (two per cent each) and bajra, maize and gram (one per cent each). The index for minerals’ group shot up by 1.2 per cent to 121.9 from 120.5 due to 31 per cent hike in magnesite price and eight per cent in bauxite. However, there was 33 per cent dip in asbestos price, 11 per cent in ochre and one per cent in silica sand. Non-food articles’ group index fell sharply by 1.1 per cent to 148.8 from 150.4 owing to cheaper sunflower (six per cent), soyabean (five per cent), groundnut seed (three per cent), rape and mustard seed, copra, castor seed and fodder (one per cent each), while prices rose for mesta, raw wool and raw hides (two per cent each). The index for fuel, power, light and lubricants’ group, which remained firm for the last few weeks, plunged by 1.2 per cent to 227.3 from 230.1 as prices fell for furnace oil (eight per cent), naptha (seven per cent), kersoene and bitumin (four per cent each), petrol (three per cent) and high speed diesel oil and light diesel oil (two per cent each). The index was 220.2 in the previous year. Manufactured produex fell by 0.1 per cent to 144 from 144.1 due to fall in the price of food, textiles, paper, rubber, plastic and chemical products. The index was 143.9 a year ago. The index for food products’ group was down by 0.1 per cent to 145.1 from 145.2 on account of lower prices for rice bran oil (three per cent) and all kinds of bran and salt (two per cent each). But prices rose for solvent extracted groundnut oil (two per cent) and hydrogenated vanaspati and gingelly oil (one per cent each). Textiles’ group index fell by 0.1 per cent to 118.2 from 118.3 as prices fell for texturised yarn (two per cent) and nylon filament yarn, woollen yarn and hessian cloth (one per cent each), while price of viscose filament yarn was up by four per cent. The index for paper and paper products’ group declined by 0.1 per cent to 170.6 from 170.8 due to three per cent fall in the price of all kinds of boards. Rubber and plastic products’ group index fell by near one per cent to 125.3 from 126.4 owing to lower prices for giant tyres (three per cent) and motor tyres, tractor tyres and giant tubes (one per cent each). The index for chemicals and chemical products’ group fell by 0.1 per cent to 168.5 from 168.7 as prices fell for all kinds of acid (four per cent), phenol (three per cent) and carbon black (two per cent), while there was three per cent hike in the price of pvc resins. (PTI) |
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Indian liquor industry demands level playing field MUMBAI, Feb 3: The Indian liquor industry has demanded a level playing field in the post World Trade Organisation (WTO) regime in order to face the challenges from multinational liquor firms. In a memorandum to the Union Government, major domestic liquor firms urged that the internal liberalisation must precede globalisation of the trade. The recent trend indicated that it is always the privilege of the developed nations to get market access in the developing world while they themselves adopt a protective policy for their domestic firms by providing various incentives. In India, there is an urgent need to harmonise various duties at international levels and bring the domestic packaging, labeling and distribution regulations to Indian manufacturers of foreign liquor. Currently, the basic duty on spirits has been maintained at 210 per cent plus an additional duty of 75 to 150 per cent based on the landing value of the products. The industry demanded uniform market access to all member countries under the WTO rule and equal treatment to all imported and domestic products. (UNI) |
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Pak says poised to gain from Afghan rebuilding NEW YORK, Feb 3: Pakistan, whose economy has already recovered after initially being hurt by the Afghan war, stands to benefit further from the reconstruction of its war-ravaged neighbor, Finance Minister Shaukat Aziz told a television in an interview. Aziz estimated that the war on terrorism had cost Pakistan 2 billion to 3 billion dollars due to a general slide in economic confidence, a drop in tax revenues and a temporary reduction in exports until buyers realized that factories were far from the fighting. But with foreign aid coming in and Pakistan’s proximity to Afghanistan giving it a key role in the reconstruction effort, Aziz said further economic progress is seen. "Pakistan is seen, because of its geographical position, as a major player in Afghan reconstruction," Aziz said yesterday. "Afghanistan is landlocked. They use our ports and roads and a lot of material can and will go from Pakistan, if it’s competitive and if it’s quality stuff," he added. Aziz made no predictions about how much the economy would grow as a result in Pakistan, but said cement, steel and other reconstruction materials as well as general provisions crossing into Afghanistan from his country were already helping. Partners in the US-led aid coalition and donors have pledged 1.4 billion dollars over two years, and half has come in. Since September 11, investor confidence has already improved, stocks have risen 15 percent, the currency has gained 10 percent and foreign exchange reserves have reached a historic high of 5 billion dollars. Aziz stressed that economic reforms implemented before September 11 as Pakistan completed its first International Monetary Fund program had helped cushion the impact of the war but acknowledged that the lifting of US trade sanctions that followed President Pervez Musharraf’s pledge to fight terrorism had not hurt either. However, he said there was no quid pro quo. "There was a growing feeling all across the world... That a strong, stable moderate and modern Pakistan, an Islamic state, will be better off if there’s less of a feeling of deprivation, there’s more economic development, more growth, more jobs. "The donors did realize that it was not throwing money in a bottomless pit, but actually if this money does come in and it is used effectively to fight poverty, it reduces the feeling of deprivation which then leads to extreme behavior," he said. Aziz said Pakistan stood apart from other countries like argentina, where poor policies prompted the IMF to turn off the taps of its financial support, triggering the largest sovereign debt default in history. "Good economic management, support to the coalition, and really a stand taken by President Musharraf on principle to fight terrorism, is what is unique to the Pakistan situation, which frankly cannot be replicated by any other country. "It’s just sheer geography which has caused this to happen," he added. In December Pakistan got 109.5 million dollars from the IMF, the first tranche of a recently agreed three-year 1.31 billion loan program to reduce poverty and encourage economic growth that was designed to offset the impact of the war in neighbouring Afghanistan. The loan paved the way for the rescheduling of 12.5 billion in debt owed to the Paris Club of Creditors and followed Islamabad’s successful conclusion in September of a 596 million dollars IMF standby arrangement. But the country, which spends 83 per cent of its annual revenues on debt servicing and defence, remains buried under more than 65 billion dollars in foreign and domestic debt. (AGENCIES) |
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