China’s exports to India zooms 34.4 per cent in first 9 months

BEIJING, Nov 22: Even as India-China bilateral trade is set to achieve an all-time high of over USd four billion in 2002, Chinese exports to India during the first nine months have registered an impressive 34.4 per cent growth over the same period last year.

While bilateral trade during January-June period of this year was somewhat lackluster, the momentum has picked up during the third quarter, official sources said here today.

Bilateral trade from January to September amounted to USd 3.44 billion, up 28.7 per cent over the corresponding period last year, according to latest Chinese customs statistics.

While Chinese exports to India increased by 34.4 per cent to USd 1.848 billion, India’s exports to China touched USd 1.596 billion, up 22.7 per cent.

"If the current trend persists, India-China bilateral trade will easily cross the four billion US dollar-mark and achieve a new record this year," first secretary (commercial), Indian embassy, Dinesh K Patnaik said.

In 2001, India-China trade amounted to USd 3.596 billion, up 23.4 per cent over 2000.

Indian exports to China last year reached USd 1.7 billion, up 21.3 per cent while Chinese exports to India touched USd 1.896 billion, up 25.6 per cent. China enjoyed a trade surplus of USd 196 million.

China’s exports to India continued to spurt during the first nine months of the year with organic chemicals, electronic machinery and TV picture tubes growing at a rapid pace. (PTI)

Synergy between army, industry key to indigenisation: MoD

NEW DELHI, Nov 22: Ministry of Defence has called for greater synergy between the Indian army and the industries for achieving the goal of total indigenisation of the forces by the year 2010.

Referring to the steps being taken by the Ministry of Defence to involve more private players in the production and distribution of defence equipment, Defence Secretary, Mr Subir Dutta said, "private sector has been associated with the acquisition councils of the armed forces and the working of the defence procurement boards have been streamlined to enable the entry of more private sector in defence procurement."

Addressing, a two-day seminar on "army-industry partnership, frontier technologies-a way ahead" organised jointly by the Indian Army and Confederation of Indian Industries (CII), here yesterday, Mr Dutta said, "because of the closed-door policy that we have been following for the last fifty years, there may be some bottlenecks initially, but the industry should realise this and try to find their way out."

He said to make the procurement policy of the armed forces more transparent, a separate website is being created by his ministry.

Giving the stringent quality standards followed by the army as regards to their equipment, Mr Dutta advised the industry to be well aware of them before entering the defence production sector.

"Industry should not only look at the short-term objective of meeting the demands of the Indian army, but should look for exporting defence equipment made in India and for that they have to make themselves technologically at par with the best in the world," he said.

Assuring the private sector companies full co-operation from the Government in entering the hitherto untouched sector of defence production, Mr Dutta said, its high time that we start working out the finer details of defence manufacturing and move out of the conceptual and planning stage. Delivering his theme address, master general of ordnance, Lt Gen. S J S Saigal called upon the private industries to take advantage of the huge infrastructural back up provided by the army by way of ordnance factories and defence supply units and undertake production and execution of orders through them.

Stressing the need for high-standards of quality management in defence equipment, he said, "for the army, quality management is just not a term, it is a question of life and death for the soldier."

Giving the industries point of view, Mr A M Naik, CEO and managing director, Larsen and Toubro said, "the faith reposed by the DRDO on the private companies in the manufacturing of strategic equipment’s for nuclear and aerospace is proof of the fact that Indian industry is capable of taking up the challenges posed by the Indian army."

He also suggested that the Indian army should streamline its procedures of procurement, including overseas procurement and involve the private industries in every stage of manufacturing of defence equipment.

Managing Director of Ashok Leyland Limited, Mr R Seshayee one of largest suppliers of defence equipment’s to the armed forces said, that Indian industry is keen to enter the defence sector not because it wants its place in the "nationalist jingoism", but purely because of commercial reasons.

"We are confident of providing better equipment to the armed forces at much lesser cost which can benefit both of us," he said.

Earlier, delivering his welcome address, chairman of CII, national committee on defence, Mr Atul Kirloskar assured the representatives of the armed forces that the Indian industry is capable of maintaining the high-quality standards laid down by the army.

"The Indian army should trust the Indian industry rather than the foreign players," he said.

The large participation of private companies in the two-day event was a testimony to the fact that the industry is eager to enter the defence sector, he added.

Nearly, 250 representatives of the Indian industry are participating in the two-day seminar-cum-exhibition where a wide range of equipment from trucks and multiple-missile carriers to uniforms, fire-proof tents, night-vision equipment, wireless and telecommunication sets and navigation equipment have been displayed.

The three sessions planned during the deliberations will discuss the entire gamut of issues pertaining to army-industry co-operation. (UNI)

Members concerned over fall in Intl prices of tea, coffee

NEW DELHI, Nov 22: Expressing concern over fall in the international prices of tea, coffee, rubber and cardamom, Government today assured Lok Sabha that it had initiated a series of measures to deal with the current price situation.

Replying to a calling attention motion in the House, Commerce and Industry Minister Arun Shourie said in recent years the prices of these commodities in international markets were generally depressed and this had had its effect upon them produced and exported by India. The Government is fully alive to the problems of these commodities, he said.

Spelling out measures for coffee growers, he announced restructuring of term loan as well as crop loans for them, interest subsidy to small growers, programme for quality upgradation, enhancement of productivity and package of incentives for export of coffee and innovative marketing strategies in national as well as domestic markets to arrest the decline in exports and also to increase domestic consumption.

As regards tea, he said basic customs duty on import of tea had been raised from 70 to 100 per cent from 2002-03 and excise duty on tea has been lowered from Rs two per kg to Rs one per kg.

A factory upgradation scheme has been implemented by the tea board to encourage production of good quality orthodox and non-reconditioned ctc teas in the country, he said, adding the Government has also provided financial incentives to the export of tea for meeting part of cost of handling, packaging and transport/freight charges. (PTI)

Rs 10 coins to be circulated

NEW DELHI, Nov 22: The Government plans to issue a new series of coins, including in the Rs 10 denomination, the Lok Sabha was informed during question hour today.

There is also a proposal to import coins of small denominations such as Re one and Rs two and five in view of the scarcity of such coins, Minister of State for Finance Anandrao V Adsul said in a written reply.

For import of coins, the Government will resort to floating of global tender, he said.

PAN: A total of 2.71 crore Permanent Account Number (PAN) applications have been received till October 31, of which 9.04 lakh applications had core deficiencies. PAN has been allotted in 2.53 crore cases till October 31.

Instructions have been issued to field officers for allotment of PAN in all valid applications within ten working days.

Insurance: The Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA) has asked the insurers to strictly follow the motor tariff approved by the tariff advisory committee following complaints from transporters about revision of motor tariff by insurance companies.

Xerox: Investigations has not so far revealed that the Xerox Modicorp Ltd had paid bribes to Government officials, MoS Finance Gingee N Ramachandran said.

Documents seized by the Income Tax Department during search and seizure operations carried out in July at the premises of the company and connected persons indicated that the company generated cash by making payments to certain entities by whom no service was rendered and the company released payments to sale employees under cash vouchers.

Narcotics: Seizures indicate that part of the southbound illicity trafficking in narcotic drugs, particularly heroin, is through routes which include Bangalore.

Exchange: The total foreign exchange reserves with the RBI amounted to 65,376 million dollars as on November eight. (UNI)

Redemption pressure on US-64 declines sharply

NEW DELHI, Nov 22: The heavy redemption pressure on the US-64 scheme of the Unit Trust of India has declined this year with accruals to the scheme touching Rs 600 crore during the past two months.

Replying to supplementaries to starred question on the UTI bailout package in the Lok Sabha, Finance Minister Jaswant Singh said that the redemption pressure on the UTI had begun declining since July, 2002, unlike what happened in the previous year when the public came to know that Net Assets Value (NAV) of the UTI was much lower than the face value.

Mr Singh said the UTI had informed the Government that the repurchases under all schemes for the period July 1, 2002 to November 15, 2002 were of the order of Rs 3,023 crore against sales of Rs 3,160 crore.

According to the UTI, the estimated difference between NAV value and the assured repurchased prices upto May, 2003 was Rs 6,571 crore as on October 28, 2002. Repurchases between February 1, 2002 and October 31, 2002 have been to the extent of Rs 872 crore under assured repurchase price and Rs 186 crore under the NAV based repurchases, he said.

The minister said the Government had already announced to bifurcate the Unit Trust of India into two companies. And an ordinance to this effect had already been issued on October 29, 2002.

However, the commitment likely to devolve on the Government on account of US-64 and assured return schemes could depend upon the market conditions, the minister said. (UNI)

‘Food stock above buffer level’

NEW DELHI, Nov 22: Foodgrains stock in the country is above the buffer level and there is no crisis situation, Agriculture Minister Ajit Singh told the Rajya Sabha today.

"As the stock position of foodgrains in the country is much above the buffer level, there is no crisis", Singh said in a written reply.

In reply to another question, he said the loss of production in Kharif foodgrains is estimated to be of the order of 18.72 per cent.

While the total production of Kharif foodgrains during 2002-03 is expected to touch 90.64 million tonnes, the Kharif oilseeds output during the period is expected to be 9.89 million tonnes, he said.

Singh said Central teams have visited 15 states to assess the drought damage and they have submitted their reports.

He said states have already been sanctioned both installments of Central share of the Calamity Relief Fund (CRF) including advance release of the second installment amounting to Rs 1227.29 crore.

Further, he said, the high level committee has approved an amount of Rs 1999.14 crore, subject to adjustment of balances in the CRP of the states.

Medicinal plants: The lower share of India’s presence in the global trade of medicinal plants could be attributed to poor quality of produce, unorganised production and marketing system, lack of awareness and inadequate database, Singh said.

A task force on conservation and sustainable use of medicinal plants constituted by the Planning Commission has identified bottlenecks in the development of medicinal plants, he said.(PTI)

CID files chargesheet against Kedar, 10 others in bank scam

NAGPUR, Nov 22: Maharashtra unit of CID today filed a chargesheet against deposed chairman of Nagpur District Central Co-operative Bank (NDCCB) Sunil Kedar and 10 others in connection with the Rs 150 crore gilt scam.

The charge sheet, running to some 900 pages, was filed by state CID Deputy Superintendent and Investigating Officer Kishore Bele before the Juducial Magistrate First Class (JMFC) M R Murwar.

It took nearly 7 months from the day of surfacing of the scam and arrest of the main accused to finally submit a charge sheet.

Bele told PTI that besides Kedar others figuring in the chargesheet were Sanjay Agarwal, Ketan Sheth, Subodh Bhandari, Nandkishore Trivedi (all Mumbai), Amit Verma (Ahmedabad), Shrikrishna Potdar, Mahindra Agarwal (both Kolkata), Kanan Mewawala (Ahmedabad), Suresh Peshkar and Ashok Choudhary (both Nagpur).

Offences under sections of 406, 409, 420, 468, 471, 120b, 3iPC were registered against them. Barring Kanan Mewawala and Nand Kishore Trivedi, an employee and director of home trade limited respectively, all the accused were arrested subsequently during investigation.

Mewawala and Trivedi were absconding, Bele said.

The scam was unearthed in late April when NABARD served a notice on NDCCB for violating the prescribed norms of investing co-operative bank’s money in Government securities.

The then Chairman of NDCCB, Kedar lodged a police complaint on April 25 this year, against broking firms, Home Trade Limited, Century Investment Limited, Giltedge Investment and others, naming Sanjay Agarwal, CEO of Home Trade and Ketan Sheth, Director, as main accused for defrauding the bank, Bele said.

The district auditor Bhausaheb Avsar logded a complaint with police about gilt scam on April 29 against Kedar and others, leading to arrest of Kedar on May 3.

Public Prosecutor Prashant Sathianathan told PTI that Agarwal surrendered and was subsequently arrested by state CID on May 11 and produced before the local court. The state CID filed an affidavit before the court expressing their inability to file the chargesheet against Kedar with the stipulated period of 90 days in detention.

He was subsequently released on condition by court on expiry of 90 days in custody. Agarwal, Sheth and Bhandari were also released on conditional bail but were presently lodged in jail in Gujarat as they were facing identical criminal offences for alleged cases in Gujarat.(PTI)

Govt hopes to achieve textile export target for 2002-03

NEW DELHI, Nov 22: Despite the failure to achieve textile export target during the last three years, the Government was hopeful of achieving the target of Rs 15,5005 crore for 2002-03 as a result of increase in exports of textile goods in the last two quarters, Textile Minister Kanshi Ram Rana told the Lok Sabha today.

Replying to a spate of supplementaries during the question hour, Mr Rana said that due to global slowdown and various other reasons, the textile export target for 2000-01 and 2001-02 could not be achieved.

As against the target of Rs 12,100 crore for 2000-01, the achievment of textile exports target was of the order of Rs 10,715 crore, he said.

For the year 2001-02, the target was Rs 15,532 crore while the achievement was Rs 12,037.6 crore, he said.

Textile exports worth Rs 13,324.8 crore took place in 1999-2000 as against the target of Rs 14,385 crore.

Mr Rana said the Government had been taking various steps from time to time to achieve the textile export target. (UNI)

‘Govt committed to sell-off, remove obstacles to FDI’

NEW DELHI, Nov 22: Asserting that 8.0 per cent GDP growth was "achievable", Finance Minister Jaswant Singh today said Government was committed to carry forward the disinvestment process and remove the impediments to the inflow of Foreign Direct Investment.

"We are committed to disinvestment and it is an integral part of the reform process. There is no ambiguity in our policies," Singh told a joint press conference with US Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill after a cabinet level meeting of Indo-US Economic and Financial Forum.

Admitting that there were impediments to freer flow of FDI, Singh said it was due to rigidities and attitude in the system, which the Government was committed to removing.

"If you ask me, whether we have removed all obstacles? I will say, no. We have to streamline the process of economic reforms in India," he said.

The Finance Minister, however, said the difference between the potential and the actual FDI flow was huge. "FDI accretion in India is only a fraction of the potential," he said.

Maintaining that "the things are already looking up", Singh said the economy was projected to grow by 5.5 to 6 per cent despite most adverse conditions of drought, global slowdown, uncertainties in the gulf and stand-off with the neighbour.

Asked whether the country could achieve this, Singh said "eight per cent growth is what we believe is achieavable with some amount of favourable conditions."

Sharing Singh’s views, O’Neill said "I believe in the minister and I am impressed by the rural development especially women empowerment and micro credit system.

Elaborating on the strong economic fundamentals, Singh said the industrial output was growing by 6 per cent, exports posted double digit growth leading to a current account surplus besides burgeoning foreign exchange reserves of over 65 billion dollars, which is growing at 500 million dollars a week.

The Indo-US bilateral discussions covered wide ranging issues including ways to strengthen financial markets to promote growth with special emphasis on enhancing private access to capital to support private sector development and accelerate growth in the banking and financial sectors.

Both countries agreed on the need to promote trade and services in both traditional and non-traditional areas.

The vulnerability of financial system to abuse for terrorist purposes especially through the use of non-traditional remittance system figured prominently in the discussion.

India, which has been on the receiving end for almost two decades, shared its experience and both sides emphasised the need for continued international efforts to establish standard promoted by the financial task force and egmont group.

Both countries pledged to continue to fight against money laundering and the financing of terror and to enhance mutual cooperation.

Substantiating this view O’Neill said "I think we had success in whatever we are trying to do together. In some countries hawala is permitted and in India it is against the law. Quite clearly difference between the circumstances in India and other countries in my view is that India is doing everything it can to enforce the law". (PTI)

Procurement of cane to start on Nov 26 in western UP

MEERUT, Nov 22: In the backdrop of stepped-up stir by farmers in western Uttar Pradesh, the State Government today announced procurement of sugarcane in Bulandshahr, Ghaziabad and Meerut districts from Nov 26 and reopening of two sugar mills from November 24.

The decisions to start procurement and reopening of Daurala and Mawana mills were taken at a six-hour meeting between district chies of Meerut, Ghaziabad and Bulandshahar, management and owners of the sugar mills and Deputy Commissioner (Sugarcane) Guruddarshan Singh here.

Meerut District Magistrate Rama Raman said sugarcane crops would not be allowed to rot and it was therefore decided that Daurala and Mawana mills would reopen on Nov 24 to provide immediate relief to the agitating farmers.

Raman said rest of the mills would also return to operations from Nov 24.

He said procurement of sugarcane would begin from Nov 26 although the procurement price was yet to be decided. A decision on the price would be taken only after a ruling of the Supreme Court, he added. (PTI)

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