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India, Brazil to
sign several agreements
JPC hears
industry on soft drinks Cabinet returns
Companies Metro rolls out
bike, scooter tyres |
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Mr Vinay Piparsania, Vice-President, External Affairs, Ford India, launches sports utility vehicle Ford Endeavour near Chandigarh on Tuesday.
— Tribune photo Pankaj Sharma
Microsoft
launches MS Office 2003 Kashmir’s
11,000 SSI units untraceable SBI to finance
Bajaj Auto two-wheelers Kinetic to
upgrade 150 dealer outlets Living Media to
launch English channel by Nov 15
Nicholas net shoots up 82 pc
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India, Brazil to sign several agreements
New Delhi, October 21 Addressing a press conference after talks with Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Amorim, who is here to do the groundwork for President’s visit, Mr Sinha said, “we have quite a few agreements in mind...We will be substantiating agreements in many areas between now and January and work on those is moving,” he added. He, however, declined to elaborate. Mr Sinha, who was addressing the press conference jointly with the Brazilian Foreign Minister, said the two countries are also agreed on the subject of restructuring of the UN system, the WTO Cancun and “where to go from there” and several other areas. Mr Sinha said the two countries had held the first meeting of the Indo-Brazil Joint Commission today at which they discussed almost all areas of bilateral cooperation, including Science and Technology, IT, Agriculture, Livestock, Health. They had also agreed to work harder for intensifying relations. Besides the UN reforms, they also discussed the situation in Iraq, West Asia and the aftermath of the WTO Cancun Summit and where to go from there. “Relations between India and Brazil are acquiring a totally new dimension... The recent visit of South African President Thabo MBeki has created a momentum for trilateral cooperation between South Africa, Brazil and India”, Mr Sinha said adding that there is great deal of political will to take the relations even further. He described the trilateral cooperation between India, Brazil and South Africa very important for the developing world.
— UNI
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JPC hears industry on soft drinks New Delhi, October 21 The Joint Parliamentary Committee on Pesticides Residues in and safety standards for soft drinks, fruit juices and other beverages, which had two hearings here today and yesterday, came out with the above revelation before the mediapersons saying that the committee was examining what powers it had to act against advertisements depicting certain soft drinks as safe for consumption despite a probe going on. Briefing newspersons on the deliberations, JPC Chairman Sharad Pawar said that the representative of the
FICCI, CII and Assocham who appeared before the committee today pleaded for formulation and adoption of national norms based on Indian conditions and ground realities instead of going in for a EU norms in matters of food, water and other soft drinks. The JPC would be visiting Mysore and Calcutta based central
laboratories and a Coca Cola plant in Palaghat district where a popular agitation is going on against the overuse of ground water which has adversely affected the ground water levels, Mr Pawar said. Asked if the JPC was going to invite the Union Health Minister, Mr Pawar avoided a direct reply saying that “we will see”. In reply to a question, Mr Pawar said none of the soft drink manufacturers have communicated their intention to appear before the committee though the JPC had made it clear that any of its representative could approach the
JPC.
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Cabinet returns Companies (Amendment) Bill
New Delhi, October 21 The DCA had proposed several changes in the bill, including easing of the provision for independent directors from 50 per cent to two-thirds of the total strength of board of directors and entirely dropping the clause making a woman director mandatory on every company’s board after industry associations and the corporate world had raised serious objections to these clauses. The department is also believed to have inserted the clause capping the number of subsidiaries a company may float and making it mandatory for a group of companies to float only one investment company. “It was taken up by the Cabinet... they
(DCA) were asked to withdraw the bill and come up with a fresh draft bill,” Parliamentary Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj told reporters here. Besides, the draft also proposed to scrap the 75-year retirement age for directors on the boards of companies, sources said here. The draft bill also proposed clauses on asset sale by companies for restructuring, they added.
— PTI
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Metro rolls out bike, scooter tyres New Delhi, October 21 According to agreement between both companies, Metro Tyres will manufacture and market Metro-Continental two-wheeler tyres in India, while Continental will provide all technological support to the partner. This agreement is in addition to another long-term offtake agreement between the two companies under which the German firm has agreed to source motorcycle tyres from Metro to be sold in the international market under the brand name of Continental. “Negotiations are on with certain OEMs for the tyres and we expect something concrete to come out soon,’’ Managing Director of the Metro group Rummy Chhabra told newspersons. “In phase one, we will launch Metro-Continental motorcycle tyres in Delhi, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Rajasthan, Jammu and Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh. In the next phase we will target the western part of the country while phase three will see the launch in eastern states and the last phase in the South,’’ he said. The company has earmarked Rs 4 crore for the first year for advertising and promotion. The company has a capacity to produce 1.5 lakh bicycle tyres and an equal number of tubes per day and is supplying to almost all renowned OEM manufacturers. Mr Chhabra said of the total production, 30,000 tyres would be exported to Continental under the offtake agreement, 50,000 tyres will be sold in the replacement market while OEMs would be targeted for the balance 20,000.
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Ford Endeavour launched Chandigarh, October 21 Speaking on this occasion, Mr Vinay Piparasania, Vice President, External Affairs, Ford India, said, “We are pleased to offer Ford’s latest SUV in Chandigarh as the most affordable global SUV in India. The Ford Endeavour has been especially designed for Asian markets and offers Ford’s renowned SUV quality, luxury and safety in a comfortable and flexible seaters. It is attractive both to those looking for a global SUV as well as a high end luxury car.” He further added that built at Ford India plant at Maraimalai Nagar near Chennai, the Ford Endeavour currently had about 20 per cent local content, which will be ramped up further with growing volumes. Offered in 4x2 version, with a 4x4 option, it will be on display in select markets across the country during October with deliveries commencing from November. It seats seven passengers comfortably with easy in and out access to the third row seats.
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Microsoft launches MS Office 2003
New Delhi, October 21 As part of the launch system, the company also introduced three products — MS Information Path, MS Onenote and Office Line Communication Server. In the MS Office 2003, the company has included information rights management capabilities that will obstruct unauthorised access and use of e-mails and documents. — PTI
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Kashmir’s 11,000 SSI units untraceable
Srinagar, October 21 This came into light during the inauguration of a three-day workshop on the export potential for carpets in Europe and exim procedures here yesterday. A survey conducted by the authorities recently found that these units set up in the state are now untraceable. State Deputy Chief Minister Mangat Ram Sharma, who inaugurated the workshop, expressed his concern on it and said efforts have been made to seek their whereabouts. Speaking on the occasion, he said entreprenurial development has to play a crucial role in creating income-earning opportunities, besides increasing participation of disadvantaged and marginalised groups of the society. The development of small and medium industries would go a long way in tackling the problem of unemployment among the educated youth, he said laying stress on skill development especially when entrepreneurship is at the crossroads of liberalisation and globalisation. The workshop, organised by the newly-established Jammu and Kashmir Entrepreneurship Development Institute in collaboration with PHDCCI and Germany-based Konrad Adenader Foundation, will deliberate upon various aspects with regard to the emerging global market for the state’s carpets and handicrafts.
— UNI
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SBI to finance Bajaj Auto two-wheelers Chandigarh, October 21 It will give “preferred financial status” to SBI for extending consumer finance for purchasing Bajaj Auto vehicle in Punjab, Haryana, Himachal, J & K and Chandigarh. Mr J.P. Varma, General Manager (D&PB), SBI, said, “Customers will get finance at 11 per cent rate of interest as against 20 to 30 per cent charged by the private financiers.” In some categories, the interest rate will be 10.75 per cent. Mr Dhiraj Mullick, Regional Manager, Bajaj Auto Ltd, said, “Bajaj Auto is enjoying 42 per cent share in the Chandigarh circle comprising Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh, Himachal Pradesh and J&K. With this tie-up we are expecting a significance increase in sales during the current fiscal year.”
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Kinetic to upgrade 150 dealer outlets Chandigarh, October 21 She was in the city to inaugurate the upgraded showrooms of the company. The company is planning to give a new look to about 150 dealer showrooms in the country out of the total 450 outlets. About 100 dealer showrooms would be upgraded next year. She said Kinetic Engineering has launched four new models under the ‘‘Kinetic Biking’’ brand. In the premium segment, the company has launched two motorcycles under GF 170 series, called ‘‘GF 170 City’’ and ‘‘GF Laser.’’ Other two models are “Velocity” and “Boss 115”. The company has so far sold over 1lakh bikes in the past 21 months, including about 55,000 during the last year. She said, “We are expecting sales of over 85,000 motorcycles during the current fiscal year and about 2 lakh bikes next year. Since the market is expected to grow from the current annual volume of 35 lakh to over 1crore in the next few years, our target is to gain a share of at least 10 per cent of the total market in the next 2-3 years. Kinetic Nova was also giving tough competition in the gearless scooter market. Referring to the fall in scooter market, Ms Motwani said,“No doubt, the annual scooter market has come down from about 20 lakh to just 10 lakh. But, the gearless scooter market was still growing and constituted 7 lakh sales annually.” The Kinetic group, she said, was expecting a turnover of over Rs 1,100 crore. It included export of about 22,000 motorcycles as against 10,000 exported last year. |
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Living Media to launch English channel by Nov 15 Chandigarh, October 21 Talking to TNS over telephone from Delhi, he disclosed that the soft launch of the channel had received an overwhelming response in the market. Despite its limited coverage in the country, the new channel was getting 10-12 minutes time of viewers and had got over 14 per cent share in its segment as per the latest TRP ratings. The channel will be fully restructured and new programmes will be introduced after getting feedback from the market, he said. Mr Krishnan said despite the entry of other news channels like Star News, NDTV India, Aaj Tak was still holding number one position with TRP being 39-40 per cent of the total share of private news channels. Programmes like Juram Aaj Tak, Seedhi Baat, Cinema Aaj Tak were the most popular programmes among the viewers. |
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Chandigarh, October 21
