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Govt to revive IDPL plants
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Bharti opts out of Delhi airport project
New Delhi, September 12 Dealing a major blow to the airport modernisation process, the Bharti-Changi partners today withdrew from the consortium which had made a bid for the privatisation of Delhi airport less than a fortnight ago.
Oracle to buy rival Siebel
Seek consent before making services chargeable, says TRAI
MoU to explore investment avenues
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Job growth in Asia disappointing: ILO
Industrial output up in July
Guj NRE Coke bags stake in Aussie firm
Pak textiles’ entry resented
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Govt to revive IDPL plants
New Delhi, September 12 The Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilisers has taken this decision, to revive all five units of the IDPL to ensure adequate role for PSUs in ensuring the availability of essential drugs at affordable prices. According to information available, the decision was taken last week, at a high-level meeting chaired by Ram Vilas Paswan, Union Minister of Chemicals, Fertilisers and Steel, as a follow up action of the recommendations made by the expert committee on the revival of IDPL, constituted by the government earlier. Member of Parliament Gurdas Dasgupta also attended the meeting, besides senior officials of the ministry and Members of the Technical Expert Committee. At present, the decision regarding revival of the IDPL is pending with Appellate Authority for Industrial and Financial Reconstruction (AAIFR). The previous government had decided to close down the IDPL and most of the employees have been given voluntary retirement. In a departure from this decision, it was decided to take effective steps to give a new lease of life to the IDPL so as to ensure availability of medicines to the masses at affordable prices. In this regard, the minister appreciated the commendable contributions of IDPL when it came to the forefront to supply doxycycline to the victims of the recent floods in Mumbai at a short notice. He also stated that the government is coming up with a new pharmaceutical policy wherein it is proposed to make it mandatory for the Central Government departments to purchase medicines from the PSUs. The work of revival of the IDPL and its units would start from October 1, 2005, and is expected to be completed within a period of two and a half years. It was also decided that government would inform AAIFR of the decision for revival of IDPL as a whole in the next hearing scheduled to be held tomorrow. Thereafter, a detailed revival package for IDPL would be got approved from the competent authority. In order to ensure timely implementation of the revival process and release of required funds for this purpose, the ministry has decided to form a committee headed by Dr. J S Maini, Additional Secretary and Financial Adviser. Other members of the committee would be CMD, IDPL, Joint Secretary, (Chemicals) and Director, National Institute for Pharmaceutical Education and Research (NIPER). It is learnt that the ministry has also decided to appoint NIPER, Mohali, as the external consultant for the revival process. Further, the government will provide funds to the IDPL so that the work of Schedule-M could be implemented. With compliance of Schedule-M, the production of IDPL will meet both national and international standards. At present, three plants namely Gurgaon, Rishikesh and Chennai are producing medicines to a limited extent while the chemical plant at Muzaffarpur and bulk drug and formulation plant at Hyderabad have been closed.
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Bharti opts out of Delhi airport project
New Delhi, September 12 Citing “frustration” of Changi, the Bharti group said its Singapore-based partner was not happy with the bid terms which were recently announced by the government. It said Changi was not confident of meeting the bid terms. Bharti, Changi and the DLF had formed a consortium for privatisation of the Delhi airport. Eight pre-qualified bidders were given two weeks on August 31 to submit their technical and financial bids for rebuilding Delhi and Mumbai airports of world-class standards. The bidding process attracted eight entities, including Reliance, DLF, GMR, Bharti and Larsen and Toubro. The government had decided to modernise and restructure Delhi and Mumbai airports through the joint venture route at a cost of Rs 20,000 crore over 15 to 20 years. While a consortium of private companies was to hold 74 per cent equity (of which foreign investment can be 49 per cent), the remaining 26 per cent would rest with the Airports Authority of India (AAI) and other government institutions. The Changi withdrawal comes two days before the evaluation of bids had to begin after September 14 by a panel of experts. — UNI
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Oracle to buy rival Siebel
Philadelphia, September 12 Oracle, which will become the world’s biggest customer relationship management software maker if the deal goes through, said the agreement was worth $ 3.61 billion after subtracting Siebel’s $ 2.24 billion in cash. Siebel gained prominence in the late nineties as a top maker of software that helps companies better understand and manage their relationships with customers, one of the market’s fastest-growing areas. But as Siebel’s share of that market gets chipped away by stiff competition, analysts have increasingly considered it a prime takeover prize for a rival like Oracle. Kaufman Brothers analyst Peter Jacobson said some shareholders might call for Oracle to pay more, but he noted that Siebel has struggled with performance and undergone a lot of organisational change. “More often than not, these deals go through at agreed-to valuations,” Mr Jacobson said. Oracle said the companies’ joint customers have recommended such a deal for more than a year, and Siebel tagged the combination of its software applications with Oracle’s development capacity as one of the deal’s strengths. Most of Siebel’s systems run on the Oracle database. Siebel shareholders will receive $ 10.66 per share in cash unless they elect to be given Oracle common stock — but no more than 30 per cent of Siebel’s common shares will be exchanged for Oracle stock. The companies expected the deal to close early next year.
— Reuters
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Seek consent before making services chargeable,
New Delhi, September 12 The authority today issued a direction making it mandatory for ISPs to obtain explicit consent of the subscribers before making such services chargeable. TRAI had, earlier, issued a similar direction to the fixed and mobile operators. The direction is in the context of instances that have come to notice where ISPs charge subscribers for value additions without obtaining their explicit consent. A prominent ISP had recently provided value additions in the form of unlimited access at a monthly fee. The service was activated to all dial-up customers with the condition that unless the customer calls the customer care of the operator on a specific number and unsubscribes the service, the monthly charge automatically gets applicable, TRAI said. In such cases, the onus of declining the chargeable service was put on the customer. There could be a possibility that in case the customer fails to unsubscribe for the service due to any reason, he starts getting charged without his concurrence. This amounts to offering and charging for a service without the explicit consent of the customer, it said. With this direction, the authority intends to put an end to such practices. Taking note of the lack of interconnection between telecom PSUs, BSNL and MTNL with the private operators, the Department of Telecom has called for a meeting with them on Wednesday to explore solution of the long-pending problem. — PTI
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MoU to explore investment avenues
New Delhi, September12 As per the agreement, the two organisations will work towards stepping up bilateral economic and industrial initiatives in key economic areas such as information technology, business process outsourcing, precious metals, pharma, aviation etc. As part of the MoU, DTCM and the CII will exchange information and data on economic and industrial development.. Further, the two organisations will jointly organise meetings and seminars in both countries and extend cooperation to each other in promoting trade fairsand exhibitions in India and Dubai.
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Job growth in Asia disappointing: ILO
New Delhi, September 12 Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, while addressing the United Nations later this week, may find it embarrassing that despite India registering around 7 per cent growth in recent
years, unemployment is not coming down enough. The report, “Labour and Social Trends in Asia and the Pacific 2005”, claimed that some three quarters of the world’s poor- or close to two billion persons subsisting on less than the equivalent of $ 2 a day-live in Asia, mostly in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and China. The new report was issued a few days before the three-day United Nations World Summit in New York from Sept 14. “The creation of new jobs has failed to keep pace with the region’s impressive economic growth. Between 2003 and 2004, employment in Asia and the Pacific increased by a “disappointing” 1.6 per cent, or by 25 million jobs, to a total of 1.588 billion jobs, compared to the strong economic growth rate of over 7 per cent,” says the ILO report. During the same period, the report points out, the total unemployed edged up by half a million reaching 78
million, the fifth consecutive year-on-year increase since 1999. Young people aged 15 to 24 are bearing the brunt of this employment deficit, the report says, accounting for a disproportionate 49.1 per cent of the region’s jobless.
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Industrial output up in July
New Delhi, September 12 The Quick Estimates of Index of Industrial Production (IIP) with base 1993-94 for July released here today by the Central Statistical Organisation, showed that the general index stood at 212.1,which is 6.7 per cent higher as compared to the level in July ,2004. The Indices of Industrial Production for the mining, manufacturing and electricity sectors for July stand at 146.9.
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Guj NRE Coke bags stake in Aussie firm
Mumbai, September 12 The company has acquired the 5 per cent strategic stake in Resource Pacific together with coal offtake agreement for a minimum of 5 million tonnes over next 10 years, Gujarat NRE informed the National Stock Exchange. Resource Pacific will produce 4 million tonnes of coal following completion of their longwall expansion and Gujarat NRE Coke will commence the purchase of coal in the 2006, it said. The Australian company owns and operates the Newpac No 1 Collinery situated in the Hunter Valley region of New South Wales and contains one of the largest identified semi-soft coking coal reserves in the region. “This strategic investment further strengthens the position of our company in the Australian coal marketplace and secures an additional reliable source of quality coal,” said Gujarat NRE Coke, Vice Chairman and MD, Arun Jagatramka. Indiabulls Estate deal
Indiabulls Financial Services Limited today said FIM Ltd, incorporated in Mauritius, has bought 60 per cent stake in Indiabulls Estate Pvt Ltd (IEPL) for Rs 6 million. FIM Ltd, managed by US-based Farallon Capital Management LLC, has bought 60 per cent stake of IEPL, in which Indiabulls Financial Services holds 40 per cent stake, it informed the National Stock Exchange. Indianbulls had invested Rs 4 million to get the 40 per cent stake in IEPL, it said. IEPL is engaged in the construction and development of immovable properties, it added.
IVRCL strategy
The IVRCL Infrastructures and Projects Ltd has acquired 29,61,338 shares, representing 70 per cent of the shareholding of Hindustan Dorr Oliver (HDO) Ltd. The acquisition was made in accordance with the share purchase agreement the company entered with M/s Jumbo World Holdings Ltd and M/s Firestorm Finance and Trading Private Ltd, a release issued here said. HDO is now the subsidiary of IVRCL. IVRCL Chairman and Managing Director (CMD) Sudhir Reddy was co-opted as an additional director and was appointed CMD of Hindustan Dorr Oliver Ltd, subject to approval of the members at the next annual general meeting of the company. Mr R Balarami Reddy and S.C. Sekharan have also been co-opted as additional directors on the Board of HDO, the press note added.
Stake in Four Soft
Venture capital fund, India Growth Fund, a unit scheme of Kotak SEAF India Fund has acquired 11.03 per cent stake in Four Soft Ltd. The company informed the National Stock Exchange that India Growth Fund, represented by its investment manager, Kotak Mahindra Bank Ltd, has acquired 39,49,447 shares aggregating to 11.03 per cent of the total paid up capital of Four Soft on September 10. The mode of acquisition is through preferential allotment, it said.
— Agencies
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Pak textiles’ entry resented
Ludhiana, September 12 The Government of India is contemplating liberal import of textiles from Pakistan and the proposed move is a part of the ongoing process to consolidate the trade between the two countries. Textile products would also be included in the liberal imports by giving duty relaxation to Pakistan in the form of removal or dilution of specific duties imposed on import of textile items. Enquiries show that the North India’s textile industry leaders strongly feel that they are not in a position to compete with Pakistan under the existing circumstances and any concessions to Pakistan textile industry would be against the interests of the Indian textile industry. According to Mr D.L. Sharma, President, Mahavir Spinning Mills, textile industry in North India has grown in the form of clusters like Ludhiana, Amritsar, Delhi-Noida-Gurgaon and Panipat-Bhilwara clusters and is a source of livelihood for about nearly a million persons. Further, the status of the textile industry in North is fragmented and minor with technological obsolescene and operating at sub scale products. The industry also suffered due to the fiscal policies distortions pursued in the past and knitting and garmenting were put under the reserve category for SSI for a long time. It was only recently that the Government of India rectified the situation. According to Mr Sharma, power cost in Pakistan is lower compared with the cost in India. In Pakistan, the power cost is 5 cents per Kwh whereas in the North it is 10 cents per KWH. He further points out that in Pakistan labour laws are flexible and there are no trade unions, whereas in North India, the laws are rigid and the labour trade unions are very strong.
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