New Delhi, October 1
Exports grew 22.5 per cent in August to $16.64 billion year-on-year on improved global demand for Indian merchandise, raising hopes that the $200 billion target for the fiscal will be easily achieved.

Imports, however, jumped by a higher rate of 32.2 per cent to $29.7 billion in August, resulting in a trade deficit of $13.06 billion, which is a cause for worry.

From April-August this fiscal, exports grew 28.6 per cent to $85.27 billion vis-a-vis the same period last year. Shipments had grown 13.2 per cent in July.

Expressing satisfaction about the healthy growth in exports in the past few months, the Federation of Indian Export Organisations (FIEO), the apex body of exporters, said the country could even surpass the $200 billion target set by the Commerce Ministry for 2010-11.

"We expect that the growth will be positive in the coming months as well and we will achieve $200 billion target during 2010-11," FIEO president A Sakthivel said. Last fiscal, exports stood at $178 billion, he added.

Commerce Secretary Rahul Khullar had recently said the rate of "heady growth" witnessed in the first quarter of the year has clearly decelerated.

Khullar had said that while there is a marked improvement in exports this fiscal over the previous year, ‘you are well below the $17.8 billion which was achieved in August, 2009’.

Crisil Principal Economist D K Joshi said: "Exports growth will be positive, but it will not be very strong. I think the trade balance gap will be under pressure."

While exports are expanding, the rise in imports on the back of 8.8 per cent economic growth in the first quarter of this fiscal and the widening gap between exports and imports (trade deficit) remain the main areas of concern for the government.

The commerce ministry expects that the trade gap in the ongoing financial year will amount to $135 billion.

The sectors registering healthy exports growth include cotton yarn, gems and jewellery, iron ore, engineering and petroleum, oil and lubricants (POL). However, the readymade garments, handicrafts, handlooms and carpets sectors are still in bad shape.

Oil imports and non-oil imports during the month under review grew by 12.4 per cent to $7.79 billion and 41.1 per cent to $21.88 billion, respectively. — PTI

Mumbai, October 1
Tata Motors, India's leading vehicle maker with about two-thirds share in the local market, is likely to launch a $525-million share sale to institutional investors on Friday, two sources said.

In June, Tata Motors had said it planned to raise about 47 billion rupees ($1.1 billion) through a combination of shares, bonds, debentures and other equity-linked instruments to cut debt and grow its business.

The company, which had net debt of about $4 billion on its books at the end of March 2010, has reduced its debt-to-equity ratio to 2.05 from 4 in March 2009.

Last year, Tata Motors raised about $750 million through the issue of global depository shares and convertible notes, and paid off the entire outstanding debt incurred in its acquisition of the Jaguar and Land Rover (JLR) brands from Ford in 2008. — Reuters

Mumbai, October 1
Mahindra and Mahindra has announced its entry into the motorcycle market with two new offerings: Stallio and Mojo. Stallio, a 110 cc bike priced below Rs 45,000, targets the mass market, while the Mojo is a high-performance bike with an engine capacity of 300 cc. The Mahindra Mojo will sell for Rs 1.75 lakh.

M&M vice-chairman Anand Mahindra said the two-wheelers will incorporate design elements from the Mahindra-owned Italian boutique design house, Engines Engineering.

The Stallio will be available in two variants — self start/cast alloy wheels/digital console and kick start/spoke wheels and priced between Rs 44,699 and Rs 41,199. It will carry a warranty for four years. On the other hand, the Mojo would be sold only via select outlets. The Mahindras entered the two wheeler markets with the launch of its scooters about a year ago.

“In the last 12 months, Mahindra 2 Wheelers has achieved a milestone by selling 1.50 lakh units — a clear validation of the success of our niche power scooters strategy. We are now all geared up to redefine the biking experience in India with the Stallio and the Mojo, which are a potent blend of global technology and innovation and will take the category to the next level,” Mahindra said.

New Delhi, October 1
The Supreme Court on Friday stayed the order of the Madras high court directing Sterlite Industries to close down its copper smelting plant in Tuticorin, Tamil Nadu.

A bench comprising Justice R V Raveendran and H L Gokhale stayed operation of the order of the high court till October 18, the next date of hearing.

“There would be a stay on the judgement of the high court. List it on October 18 for hearing,” the bench said.

Senior advocate C A Sundaram, appearing on behalf of Sterlite Industries, submitted that if the high court order is not stayed, then it would be a great injury to the company, as the plant would have to be shut down.

Sterlite Industries, a subsidiary of UK-based Vedanta Group, had moved the apex court yesterday against the order of the high court, which on September 28 ordered shutting down of the smelting plant for not complying with environmental norms.

The company, in a special leave petition against the order, had claimed that the high court did not give it a proper hearing and ignored its submissions.

The high court had held that Sterlite’s plant was within 25 km of an ecologically fragile area and the company has failed to develop a green belt of 250 metre width around the plant.

The order came a month after the Vedanta Group’s Rs 7,000 cr bauxite mining project at Niyamgiri Hills in Orissa was denied environmental clearance. The company was also issued a showcause notice by the Ministry of Environment and Forests for allegedly f louting green norms.

“The materials on record show that the continuing air pollution being caused by the noxious effluents discharged into the air by the respondent company is having a more devastating effect on the people living in the surroundings,” the high court order sa id. The shares closed higher at Rs 175.05 up 4.95 per cent on the BSE — PTI 

New Delhi, October 1
The Indian government has manual access to Canadian Research in Motion's BlackBerry messenger services and is hopeful of getting automated access from January 1, a top official said on Friday.

India, which along with several other countries has expressed concerns that BlackBerry services could be used to stir political or social instability, had threatened RIM with a ban if it were denied access to data.

"We have manual access to the messenger services. We want automated access and we are hopeful of getting that from January 1," G.K. Pillai, home secretary, told Reuters.

The Indian interior ministry said on Aug. 30 that the Canadian firm had offered several ways to allow authorities to monitor BlackBerry communications. The government said it would check their feasibility over the next 60 days.

Saudi Arabia, fretful over services such as online pornography, has reached a deal with RIM on access to the BlackBerry Messenger instant messaging service, a consumer product that operates outside of the secure corporate domain, according to government sources. Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates have raised similar concerns, with the UAE setting an Oct. 11 deadline for RIM. — Reuters

New Delhi, October 1
With one of the companies entrusted with rolling out Mobile Number Portability (MNP) in the country facing security clearance problems, the service is likely to miss its latest deadline of October 31.

MNP allows users to change operators while retaining the same number. However, reports suggest that one of the two operators selected for managing number portability in the country is yet to get security clearance from the government.

MNP Interconnection, in which US-based Telcordia holds 74 percent, was one of the two number portability operators selected by the government to offer services in the country. The other was Syniverse Technologies Inc.

The firm received Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) clearance in March 2009, but the home ministry revoked clearance in August on security grounds.

Following this the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) issued showcause notice to Telcordia asking that why its licence for MNP should not be cancelled. Telcordia has time till the third week of October to respond to DoT, which may lead to a delay in the roll out of the service.

DoT also has the option of asking Syniverse to manage number portability across the country and meet the deadline.

The deadline for MNP has been revised three times and the process has had a delay of a year.

Incidentally, DoT has put a condition on the telecom operators in the country that they would not be allowed to roll out any new services if they were not ready for the MNP by October 31.

Jammu, October 1
Endorsing the demand of Jammu Chamber of Commerce and Industries (JCCI), All Jammu Hotels and Lodges Association (AJHLA) today demanded that concession of restructuring and rescheduling of loans to the traders of Kashmir Valley should also be given to traders in Jammu and Ladakh regions.

In view of the present turmoil in valley, the government had agreed to shell out the concession to traders in Kashmir.

In a meeting the AJHLA today assailed what it dubbed “gross discrimination of Jammu by the state and the central governments”.

Association president Inderjeet Khajuria said that hospitality and tourism related industry in Jammu had been the worst victim of discrimination at the hands of state and the central governments.

“All the packages of relief, rehabilitation and incentives for revival of tourism related trades have remained confined to Kashmir valley, while tourism related trade in Jammu region, which has equally suffered during these 20 years of militancy and turmoil in the state, have been blatantly ignored,” he said.

The association has demanded extension of all the packages by the central and state governments to the tourism industry in Jammu as well.

The association observed that during the past four months of violence in Kashmir, hotels, lodges and other tourism related business in Jammu also suffered major setback.

Even in Amarnath Yatra, the figure could touch only a little over four lakhs. This adversely affected the occupancy in hotels and lodges in Jammu, said Khajuria.

Through another resolution AJHLA welcomed the balanced judgment delivered by Lucknow bench of Allahabad High Court yesterday, which should go a long way in fostering communal harmony and goodwill in the country.

The Association particularly welcomed the matured reaction by all sections of the people, who have pledged and appealed for maintaining peace and brotherhood in the wake of judgment.

The Association observed that interests of tourism related trades in Kashmir and Jammu were interlinked. If tourism suffers in Kashmir, it has an adverse effect on Jammu as well.