 |
| Saturday, February
24, 2001, Chandigarh, India   
|
Threat of cheap imports exaggerated
Computers get cheaper
Maruti cheers with 30 pc sales growth Green mini skirt excites fashion pundits The end of the
typewriter |
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
What pushes Indians
abroad Spice extends
roaming facility to Delhi Close-up ad in ‘bad taste’, banned
|
|
Threat of cheap imports exaggerated Mumbai, February 23 Analysts say the reform-minded Sinha is expected to resist pressure from industry and opposition leaders for higher tariffs, as part of his ongoing drive to liberalise the economy. “Lowering the average rate of tariffs and continuing with the liberalisation of the trade regime is the direction the Budget should take,” said S. Bhide, chief economist at the think-tank National Council for Applied Economic Research. “It will force an improvement in competitiveness and prevent allocation of resources to inefficient sectors,” he said. However, the decision on duties in Wednesday’s Budget is all the more sensitive as India prepares to drop the last of its quantitative restrictions (QRs) on imports to meet World Trade Organisation commitments. These QRs, a relic of India’s past policy of matching political non-alignment with economic self-sufficiency, can be replaced under WTO rules by higher tariffs. Industry leaders and opposition leaders, fearing a flood of cheap imports from China and East Asia, are pressing hard to keep tariffs high, and in some cases increase them. But analysts say that Sinha is likely to resist pressure to hike import duties when QRs on over 700 items, mostly textiles, farm and consumer goods are dropped on April 1. Media reports have quoted Commerce and Industry Minister Murasoli Maran as saying domestic industry should focus on efficiency rather than seek protection. Maran has however added a safety net — he has promised a Bill next week which will allow the government to hike tariffs on any product which becomes vulnerable when QRs are dropped. Officials and analysts say that the threat posed by cheap imports following the scrapping of QRs had been exaggerated. In fact, government officials said they had actually found a decrease in imports, excluding oil and gold, after the partial removal of QRs last year. The perceived threat from China was also overplayed, said Arun Goyal, Director at Delhi’s Academy of Business Studies. He noted that Indian exports to China exceeded imports from there and, in areas where the two compete, Indian products were of a superior quality. And hiking duties could be counter-productive since industry has very strong inter-sectoral linkages, analysts said. The freeing of imports has been a boon for the Indian consumer who no longer has to pay a high premium for smuggled international brands, particularly processed foods, toiletries and apparels which are now sold off shop shelves legally. Total imports, however, still account for only 13 to 14 percent of GDP while industrial imports, excluding oil and key farm items like fertilisers account for less than 6 per cent, said T.K. Bhowmick, senier adviser at the CII.
Quake limits scope to cut tariffs
But while Sinha is expected to resist pressure to raise tariffs, his scope for lowering them is limited by the need to curb the budget deficit while also raising funds to pay for reconstruction after last month’s devastating earthquake. The quake in western India caused damages worth at least 200 billion rupees ($4.3 billion). Indian tariffs are higher than averages in South-East Asia, though they are below the maximum rates set by the WTO. India’s peak tariff on industrial products is 40 percent, and the mean 27.5 percent tariff compares with 12 to 13 percent in the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN). Domestic industry has been lobbying hard to keep tariffs high in most sectors given sluggish industrial production. The CII in its Budget wish-list, said there was no need for a cut in peak tariffs and also argued that reducing rates now would restrict India’s bargaining space at the next round of WTO negotiations. The Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) had a similar wish-list. “There should be no further reduction in import duty for a period of 2-3 years,” it said. In specific sectors though demands are more diverse. Telecommunication firms have asked for lower duties on cellular handsets to counter cheaper smuggled goods while the auto industry has asked for high duties and other safety conditions to be imposed on imports of second-hand cars. The Petroleum Ministry wants lower duties on petroleum products and crude oil and the paint industry is asking for lower tariffs on raw materials. The one area where analysts believe India could rightfully use tariff walls to prevent dumping is agriculture, where India is grappling with a huge 40 million tonnes stockpile of foodgrains and which in most countries is subsidised.
Reuters
|
|
Computers get cheaper Chandigarh, February 23 Two companies — HFCL Infotel and Xenium have come up with fully loaded PCs at rates as low as Rs. 19,500. These branded PCs (which are available at different rates) are available in the market in different packages and add-ons. HFCL has come up with a “Connect PC” which is being offered in two packages (Rs. 26,500 and Rs. 27,500 — inclusive of sales tax) by the company. The home PC being offered by HFCL is equipped with 64 MB RAM, a 14” colour monitor, 2 extension speakers, an inbuilt sound card , 10.2 GB Hard Disk Drive , 1.44 MB Floppy Disk Drive (FDD), inbuilt AGP Card and a modem, LAN card and a TV or a Video tuner card . The PC has a cyrix M II 266 Mhz processor. The company is offering a PC with above specifications for Rs. 26,500 alongwith which one also gets a one and a half year unlimited internet access through BSNL telephone line and also a warranty of one year. The other package which is available in areas connected by HFCL wireline comes for Rs. 27,500 alongwith a 3 years unlimited Internet access, a free Connect telephone line and one year of free maintenance. The company will launch its services in Jalandhar and Amritsar shortly as a result of which the residents of these cities will also be able to avail the second package where a free telephone line is offered. Xenium is offering a Xenium Cyrix-III which has a Cyrix Mill 500 Mhz processor, 32 MB RAM , 10.2 GB Hard Disk Drive , an Intel 810 chipset, 1.44 MB FDD, Microsoft Trekker 2 button mouse and a 14 inch Samsung color monitor , multimedia keyboard priced at Rs. 27,450 . In case one opts for a VGA mono (a black & white monitor), one gets the same PC for Rs. 19,500, a company official said. For addons one has to make additional payment , like getting a 64 MB RAM in lieu of 32 MB would cost one additional Rs. 450. Xenium is also offering a discount up to Rs. 2,000 on its computers . A fully loaded , branded computer which can meet almost all the home computer and Internet requirements at such low price is a great convenience for the consumer”, said Mr. Vijay Kaul , Chief Marketing Officer, HFCL. He said that the company hopes to increase PC penetration in socio- economic category A & B residents . “In the four major cities of Punjab (Ludhiana, Jalandhar, Patiala, Amritsar) and Chandigarh, only 20,000 units are having PCs, according to a recent survey report by IDC. Cost has been a major deterrent in this. With reduction of costs, we expect a substantial increase in the number of houses having PCs”, said he. PC costs may further reduce, say the officials of these companies. “Any cut in the sales tax would further reduce the costs, though that cannot be expected to be very high”, said Mr. Kaul. The sales tax component, reportedly at present is around Rs. 1,000.
|
|
Maruti cheers with 30 pc sales growth
New Delhi, February 23 Maruti sold 35,844 units last month against 27,701 units in January, 2000, which was an improvement over its cumulative performance where sales fell by 14 per cent at 274,938 units, as per the latest figures by the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers. Overall, the passenger car market registered 6.27 per cent negative growth in the April-January period at 477,251 units. Among the manufacturers which were badly hit by the sluggish market conditions was Korean car maker Daewoo Motors whose sales fell by as much as 40 per cent to 2,526 units last month even as its performance was cheerful during the April-January period with 30 per cent hike at 38,551 units. Yet another Korean company Hyundai, however, registered better sales at 9,066 units last month against 8,655 in January 2000; the company’s cumulative sales were also up at 69,881 units against 59,995 in the corresponding period of the previous year. But while the passenger car market showed signs of cheer, two wheeler scooter sales declined sharply by as much as 41 per cent to 66,834 in January, 2001, whereas the fall was contained at 28 per cent for the April-January period at 753,342 units, as per siam. Bajaj Auto sales declined to almost half in January this year at 28,997 units against 54,787 units in the same month last year whereas the cumulative decline since April last was slower at 38 per cent units. The tale of woe was repeated with LML where January sales were again down to almost half at 11,457 units, mirroring the overall cumulative downslide in April-January period at 37 per cent fall at 150,156 units. The only exception to the sorry tale of scooter manufacturers was Kinetic Motor Company, whose sales rose marginally to 9,962 units in January this year against 9,228 in January, 2000. The company also witnessed an uptrend in fiscal sales at 105,726 units, which translated into an almost 10 per cent sales increase.
PTI
|
|
Green mini skirt excites fashion pundits Milan, February 23 The big Italian designers chose to keep their latest collections under wraps but those following shows elsewhere have already spotted some of the trends for next year. “We’ve been seeing a lot of green, and other earth tones such as browns, oranges and creams. And the military look was strong in New York and London,” said Bronwyn Cosgrave, Associate Editor at the British edition of fashion bible Vogue. “What Milan does is to pick up what is experimented with in the other cities and translate it into some very wearable suits and coats,” she told Reuters. “What we won’t see is dresses with a chain of balloons like I saw at Alexander McQueen last night.” Is green the new black, or staple fashion colour? Perhaps, but, whatever happens, Cosgrave certainly hopes the “new black” will not be black itself: “It always works, but it’s boring — I hope designers will have more imagination than that.” Fashion pundits predicted sharply tailored suits, the sort of thing Milan does so well in complete contrast to the off-beat showmanship on display in the USA and Britain. In Milan, the fashionista grows up and abandons her rebellious, Anglo-Saxon ways for something classier and more understated. But that is not to say demure and retiring. Hilary Alexander, Fashion Editor at Britain’s Daily Telegraph newspaper, predicts a surfeit of daring mini skirts. “We’ve been seeing an awful lot of minis — micro-mini, ‘bum-freezer’ skirts. And the Milanese love legs,” she said from London where she has been following Fashion Week. Prada is trendsetter All eyes will be on Prada to set the trend, and Dolce & Gabbana to break it. “They’ve got their own look and they do it brilliantly — they’re outside trends,” Alexander said of the Italian duo favoured by music icon Madonna. If Madonna graces the shows she is likely to see images of her youth flashing past, as the 1980s revival continues. The glamour and confidence of early 1980s style is a favourite with black musicians — the Ghetto Fabulous look — but it also tempts others tired of the austere, minimalist ‘90s. Vogue’s Cosgrave says Donatella Versace’s style on a visit to London last week could foreshadow a return to such glamour. “She was dressed in a fantastically glittery gold, sequinned skirt and a Marilyn Monroe-type flesh coloured shirt,” she said. “I was pretty shocked at how glamorous it was.” But fashion is not just dresses — it is a huge business. Luxury goods consultant Carlo Pambianco predicts that a recent spate of acquisitions and market listings will continue to reshape an industry that saw Gucci buy Yves Saint Laurent and Prada take on Helmut Lang and Jil Sander in just two years. “The market is global, and to do business in a market like that we need to have companies with bigger dimensions,” the president of Pambianco Strategie di Impresa told Reuters. “We examined the top 10 luxury companies in Italy — through acquisitions they increased turnover by 43 percent in one year.” He said the companies’ total turnover gives them a combined share of nearly 20 percent of the global luxury goods market. “That’s the evidence”, he said, that the consolidation process means big money.
Reuters |
|
The end of the typewriter London, February 22 My reply was: “You can cure unemployment by sending people back to work.” In return, I asked him: “What is the most useful message from philosophy?” He replied: “You can’t derive an “ought” from an “is”.” Loosely translated, this means that just because you can do something, you don’t have to. Thus technological progress produces all manner of ‘improvements’ to our lives, but do we really need them all? Do improvements in our standard of living actually make us feel better? There can be a great difference between increases in gross domestic product and tangible improvements to our quality of life. The British and American experiments with monetarism in the 1980s aptly demonstrated that just because high income earners did better in boom years, this didn’t necessarily imply a “trickle down effect” of wealth and income earning possibilities down to lower income earners. As a commentator on economics, I am a believer in technical change and technological progress — at least in principle. Indeed, economics courses in schools and universities the world over teach that technology is considered a factor of production alongside land, labour and capital. However, there are times when I think an invention, from my own point of view, cannot be improved on. Economists would call such a situation “optimal”; personally I prefer the old fashioned word “ideal”. Such is my view of the old fashioned, manual typewriter. Invented in the United States in 1867 and put into commercial manufacture by gunmakers Remington & Sons in 1874, the manual typewriter is to my mind one of the greatest inventions of our time. The pace at which I can type — with two fingers — suits my work perfectly. There is a certain effort involved in typing, which prevents one from writing too much or too fast. By contrast, word processors tempt one to write too fast and, in my case, to make too many mistakes. One is a prisoner of the “cursor”, that darts all over the screen, and which I myself can never control. Frankly, I loathe word processors. I realise I am in the minority of authors and journalists, most of whom never leave their word processors these days. And I am totally dependent, given the way books and newspapers are produced, on the availability and willingness of someone to “put my copy into the system” once I have finished composing it. But this week catastrophe struck. First my main typewriter broke, then my back-up machine failed me. Then, horror of horrors, I read in the International Herald Tribune that Tytell Typewriter Co, an iconic typewriter repair and rental store in Manhattan, is preparing to close its doors. Bowing to the hegemony of the word processor, the store at 116 Fulton St “is not taking new repair orders and the business is closing.” Now, this column comes to you from London, England. I have never used Tytell’s great store. But we in Britain know that what happens in the USA usually happens here in due course. Indeed, I had a great problem finding someone in London to fix my machine last time it broke - and I have lost his card. But remembering my Olympia Monika was purchased at the famous Harrods of Knightsbridge, I decide to give the store a call. “We no longer have a typewriter department, Sir,” the sales assistant said with a tone of incredulity heavily tinged with boredom. “Does that mean you no longer mend typewriters?” I ask. “That will be the case, Sir,” he replied, this time sounding completely bored. So here I am — somewhat reluctantly — going straight for the word processor. —
By arrangement with The Guardian |
|
What pushes Indians
abroad New Delhi, February 23 The USA is the second major destination, followed by Britain, Thailand, Dubai and neighbouring Nepal. But adventurous Indians are also stepping off the beaten track and winging their way to new overseas destinations such as New Zealand, Bali, Hungary and South Africa. A PATA report said there was enormous potential for foreign travel among upwardly mobile Indians. “India is one of the world’s fastest growing economies and a lot of people can now afford foreign travel,” said Chwee. Movies made in Bollywood, India’s prolific answer to Hollywood, were a big factor boosting overseas travel. “Hindi movies are shot very often in places like Switzerland, Australia, New Zealand, or Hungary, and they have a wide market. People watch them and want to see these places,” Chwee said But not everyone can afford to keep up with the Joneses. The government said on Thursday a quarter of the billion-strong population lives below the poverty line.
Reuters
|
|
Spice extends
roaming facility to Delhi Chandigarh, February 23 Any postpaid subscriber can avail the service without paying any additional roaming security deposit. The postpaid subscriber can make and receive calls from anywhere while in Himachal, Haryana and Delhi. There will be no monthly rental for this additional service and the subscribers will only need to pay a 20 per cent surcharge on their roaming usage. Spice Telecom has also launched the enhanced Short Message Services (SMS) for its subscribers in Punjab. “Post Me”, which allows the subscribers to send messages at the same cost anywhere in India and abroad, has been revamped, according to Mr Rohit Malhotra, Vice- president, Sales and Marketing. The enhanced Short Message Services (SMS) being offered include news, finance, entertainment, lifestyle, movie listings and reviews, horoscope, latest cricket scores, book reviews and stock quotes. “If you type “JOKE” and send it as an SMS to 555 you would get a cracking joke. You can send an SMS saying MCHD for Chandigarh to get a list of theatres along with movies playing there. Replace the CHD by PAT for Patiala, LDH for Ludhiana, ASR for Amritsar, BAT for Bathinda and JLD for Jalandhar to get lists for respective cities”, said a company release.
|
|
Close-up ad in ‘bad taste’, banned New Delhi, February 23 Information and Broadcasting Minister Sushma Swaraj told reporters today that the Close-up advertisement has already been barred on Doordarshan and would be taken off all channels where it was being aired. She said it was in “really bad taste” to show a prisoner who was going to be hanged kissing a police officer in uniform as his last wish. Regarding FTV, she said the channel authorities who met her said they did not want it to be a provocative channel and agreed that there was a difference between European and Indian sensibilities. The delegation had assured the minister that the channel would address “Indian concerns” and regulate content in telecasts to the country.
PTI
|
cr
Acer Inc lays off 300 workers Car telematics services offered Turkish PM under fire for lira turmoil Marilyn Monroe photos to be auctioned |
bb
Theft in Jain office Krishi Expo Apple Computer Export to grow Birla MF Foster’s India New Corpn Bank ED |
 |
| Punjab | Haryana | Jammu & Kashmir | Himachal Pradesh | Regional Briefs | Nation | Editorial | | Business | Sport | World | Mailbag | In Spotlight | Chandigarh Tribune | Ludhiana Tribune 50 years of Independence | Tercentenary Celebrations | | 121 Years of Trust | Calendar | Weather | Archive | Subscribe | Suggestion | E-mail | |
