CII plans business events across China to boost trade......

Hindujas aim big for India power biz; may invest $10-bn.....

Bharti Q4 net profit up 37 pc; to invest $3.4 bn in FY’09....

Inflation up at 7.33 pc, pressure mounts on Govt to take steps.....

Steel prices remain steady

NEW DELHI, Apr 25: The wholesale steel prices remained unchanged today here as stockists preferred to keep activity at a low ebb after leading steel makers decided to hold steel prices for two to three months.

Traders said negligible demand from stockists and slowdown in constructions activity also kept prices unchanged.

Following were today’s quotations in Rs per tonne:

CTD saria (kamdhenu) 8-mm, 46,400, 10-mm, 45,850, 12-mm 44,840, 16-25 mm 46,150.

Rathi tor steel : 8-mm 46,000, 10-mm 45,500, 12-mm 44,600, 16-20 mm 46,050 and 25-32 mm 46,200.

Saria Jai bharat (iso 9002) 8-mm 45,800, 10 mm 45,300 12-mm 44,500, 16-25 mm 45,000.

Amba saria (iso-9002) 8-mm 45,200, 10-mm 43,700, 12-mm 44,100, 16-25-mm 44,500.

Amba shakti: (TMT) 8-mm 46,000, 10 mm 46,200, 12 mm 44,600, 16 to 25 mm 43,900.

M S Angle: (50x5) (50x6) 40,200, (25x3) (32x3) (40x3) 39,700, (40x5) (40x6) 40,400. Angle capital (ISI) (50X5) (50X6) 42,000, (40X5) (40x6) 42,500, (35X5) (65X6) 42,700.

Garder (joist) (150x75) 42,000 (175x85) 42,200 (200x100) 42,000 (125x70) 42,200. T-IRON (40X5) (40X6)(50X6) 41,500.

Ingot and Scrap: Bhivari 32,200, Govindgarh 33,200, Ghaziabad 31,000, Muzaffarnagar 30,500. (PTI)

India concerned over use of foodgrains
to produce biofuels

NEW DELHI, Apr 25: The Centre has expressed concern over the unprecedented rise in foodgrain prices making them unaffordable for the poorer sections due to use of foodgrains for bio-fuels production, Parliament was informed today.

Union Minister of State for Agriculture Kantilal Bhuria told Rajya Sabha in a written reply, India had conveyed its views at the Third International Grain Summit-2008 held at Sharm-el-Sheikh in Egypt recently.

He said household consumption requirement of rice and wheat during 2007-08 in the country was estimated at 89.47 million tonnes and 68.59 million tonnes respectively against which production was estimated at 95.68 million tonnes and 76.78 million tonnes respectively as per Third Advance Estimates-2007-08, indicating adequate availability of both foodgrains.

Regarding food security, Mr Bhuria said the National Food Security Mission had been launched from Rabi 2007-08 and was in operation in 311 districts of 17 states to enhance wheat, rice and pulses production.

As for the shortfall of foodgrains in the country, the Minister told the House that with progressive rise in total foodgrain production from 208.6 million tonnes in 2005-06 to 217.28 million tonnes in 2006-07 and 227.32 million tonnes in 2007-08 (according to the Third Advance Estimates), there was no shortfall in foodgrains in the country. (UNI)

BSNL gets Rs 1,200 cr bonanza with removal of license fee

NEW DELHI, Apr 25: State-owned Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited will get financial benefit of about Rs 1,200 crore annually with the exemption of license fee on fixed line telephony.

BSNL has annual revenue of about Rs 15,000 crore annually from its fixed line operations and the PSU pays on an average 8-9 per cent of Adjusted Gross Revenue (AGR) as license fee to the government.

"In fact, BSNL has contributed much more in the Universal Service Obligation (USO) Fund instead of getting subsidy from the government for the fixed line operations," BSNL CMD Kuldip Goyal said.

Now things are getting corrected. "I am really happy with the announcement of our minister A Raja. Exempting fixed line services from the AGR’s purview, our rural expansion plans and also in other parts of the country would get a major boost," Goyal said.

BSNL’s financial viability had taken a major hit after the removal of subsidy in terms of Access Deficit Charge, a levy paid by private players to the PSU to carry out rural operations.

The PSU was getting the ADC to the tune of Rs 5,000 crore annually till about two years ago from private players but now it has been completely waived with effect from April this year.

BSNL is fulfilling various social obligations of the government and has to operate in loss making rural areas, the officials said adding the PSU received only Rs 4,650 crore from the USO fund during 2002-06, while it contributed Rs 8,031 crore towards it.

This was a distortion in the policy and has been corrected with the minister’s decision to exempt fixed line telephony from license fee. (PTI)

CII plans business events across China to boost trade

BEIJING, Apr 25: Betting high on China, the CII will ramp up its business plans for the country in the next one year, including encouraging 100 more Indian companies to do business with the communist trading giant.

Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) is planning business events across China, a "Made-in-India" show in the booming Guanzhou city, a CEOs meet and visits by 1,000 young Indian businessmen-all aimed at increasing India’s market share in China and spurring Indian entrepreneurs to invest in the world’s fourth largest economy.

On its part, the CII would expand its Shanghai office and open one more in Beijing, CII Chief Mentor Tarun Das said here.

Buying missions from China to India are also planned, said Das, who was here with a broad agenda of trade and investment in China and to attend a meeting on space initiatives.

"India’s exports to China have a narrow base. We need to understand how to do business with China, how to sell to China and what to sell to China, specially finished products, not just iron ore. Otherwise, the trade imbalance will continue to grow", he said.

The planned activities would also help bridge the information gap and build confidence of Chinese in Indian products.

"We have to reach out to the Chinese private sector and get them to buy from India", he said, adding, CII wants to encourage 100 Indian firms to do business with China in the next one year. (PTI)

Hindujas aim big for India power biz; may invest $10-bn

NEW DELHI, Apr 25: Hinduja Group will invest 10 billion dollars in various power projects across India in the next ten years, starting with setting up of 2,000 MW generation capacity in Andhra Pradesh.

The group, run by London-based Hinduja family, will create a power generation capacity of 10,000 MW over the next ten years, for which it is negotiating with 7-8 states, its global president G P Hinduja said in an interview here.

The first of this would be the 2,000 MW Vizag project in Andhra Pradesh, he said.

The group’s total investment in the country’s power sector would work out to be around ten billion dollars (about Rs 40,000 crore), given the average cost of about one billion dollars for creating 1,000 MW capacity, Hinduja said.

The group will also consider bidding for upcoming ultra- mega power projects (UMPPs) as and when the government invites bids for the same, he said, adding that any decision in that regard would be taken only after the bids are invited and on a case-to-case basis.

While Hinduja did not wish to comment on the current status of the group’s Vizag project, it is understood that the application for coal linkage has been recommended by Central Electricity Authority and is awaiting the nod of Coal Linkage Committee.

Out of the group’s overall 10,000 MW power generation plan, Vizag project is expected to be the first to reach financial closure. (PTI)

Bharti Q4 net profit up 37 pc; to invest $3.4 bn in FY’09

NEW DELHI, Apr 25: On the back of growing subscriber base, the country’s largest telecom service provider Bharti Airtel today reported a 37 per cent increase in net profit for the quarter ended March 31, 2008 at Rs 1,853 crore.

The consolidated total revenue for Q4 ended March 31 rose 45 per cent to Rs 7,819 crore, the company said.

"We have outperformed the market. The company is gaining market share every month. For every first time customer, Airtel has become a first choice," company promoter Sunil Mittal told reporters on the sidelines of a function here.

To further strengthen its market share, the company said it would invest USD 3.4 billion in Airtel and in passive infrastructure.

"We will continue to invest and we do expect excluding passive infrastructure somewhere around USD 2.5 billion of investment in next year," Bharti Airtel President and CEO Manoj Kohli said. However, the investments would not include cost for acquiring 3G spectrum.

For the year ended March 31, Bharti Airtel’s revenue rose to Rs 27,025 crore, up 46 per cent from the last fiscal while the net profit stood at Rs 6,701 crore, up 57 per cent over the previous fiscal.

The company has been expanding its network across rural areas and added 2.5 crore subscribers in 2007-08 taking the overall subscriber base to cross 6.4 crore. In the fourth quarter alone, the company added nearly 69.27 lakh customers.

Asked about the dip in Average Revenue Per User despite growing user base, Mittal said that it is not a matter of concern now, as volumes are going up every month.

"About half of the subscribers added are from the rural areas, along with the urban areas, the rural areas have a lot of potential," Kohli said. (PTI)

Inflation up at 7.33 pc, pressure mounts
on Govt to take steps

NEW DELHI, Apr 25: Inflation rose to 7.33 per cent for the week ended April 12, bringing pressure on the government to do more to rein in prices and the RBI to further tighten money supply.

Hopes from the previous week’s data of prices easing turned out to be a fleeting relief for the Congress-led UPA Government, which is drawing flak from the opposition as also allies for its handling of the price situation.

In fact, leaders of Left parties, who prop up the UPA from the outside, met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today and asked him to take urgent steps to control soaring prices.

Inflation rose despite high base of 6.34 per cent in the year ago period as global commodity prices continued to rise. It stood at 7.14 per cent in the previous week.

Among all important food items, prices of jaggery (gur) surged by 12 per cent, followed by fish marine, sooji, oil cakes, maida, khandsari and coconut oil. However, vegetables, turned cheaper, so did imported edible oil, on which the Centre cut duties on March 31.

"If you see the rate of increase in inflation, you find fiscal measures taken by the Government are paying off. This is direct fiscal impact, but clearly the bottomline is fiscal measures have not been adequate," said HDFC Bank Chief Economist Abheek Barua.

Besides fiscal measures, RBI might also further tighten money supply in its annual policy scheduled for Tuesday. It has already announced 0.50 per cent hike in madatory cash deposits of banks, which would suck out Rs 18,500 crore from the system.

Commerce and Industry Minister Kamal Nath said in Dubai yesterday that inflation would ease to below five per cent within two months, as a result of steps already taken by the Government and RBI.

"I expect monetary tightening by RBI. Repo rate might be hiked by 25 basis points and credit control measures to curb hoarding of commodities might also be announced," Barua said.

Among food items, various pulses like gram, arhar and masur as well as pork, condiments, spices and barley also turned less expensive.

In manufactured items category, certain tobacco products like bidi became costlier, as also some chemical products like carbon black, non-metallic minerals like railway sleepers, and machine tools such as enameled copper wires, complete tractors and ari and gas compressors.

Among fuels, prices of bitumen and lubricants went up marginally.

Even though inflation started crossing five per cent mark in the latter part of February last fiscal and stood at more than seven per cent towards close of the year, average inflation was quite low at 4.51 per cent against 5.42 per cent in 2006-07.

Pointing out that international commodity prices are not coming down, Barua said, "I don’t see a dramatic increase in inflation, but it may be around seven per cent mark."

The soaring prices have become a political scoring point as some assemblies are scheduled to go for polls this year with Karnataka slated for next month.

Yesterday, NDA leaders protested against price rise and today Left party leaders met the Prime Minister on the issue.

That soaring prices are raising sensitive political barometer was also clear from the Prime Minister’s appeal to political parties to eschew the temptation of politicising the misery of the people. He also warned against creating an environment of scarcity that would encourage speculators and hoarders. (PTI)