Amritsar, November 17
Private airlines are witnessing more than 20% increase in passenger occupancy rates on the Amritsar - London-Toronto route, after Air India decided to withdraw its direct flight beginning October 30.

Qatar Airways (QA) and Turkmenistan Airlines (TA) have recorded considerable rise in the number of passengers traveling to England. Amit Dhiman, station manager, Qatar Airways, said: “There is 20 per cent increase in the number of passengers heading for London from the Amritsar Airport on our flights.”

To cater to passengers traveling to London from Sri Guru Ramdas Jee International Airport, the airline increased the frequency of its Amritsar-Doha flight from four days a week to throughout the week. This was done a couple of weeks before the discontinuation of the AI flight.

Station Manager, Turkmenistan Airlines, Dinesh Kurl, said his Airlines had also registered nearly 20 per cent intake of passengers traveling to London from Amritsar.

Coinciding with the withdrawal of AI’s Amritsar-London-Toronto flight, the airline had introduced Amritsar-Ashgabad-London twice a week, Amritsar-Ashgabad-Birmingham, and Amritsar-Ashgabad- Frankfurt, both once a week, from October 31. Besides, the decision of the AI’s management to reduce the number of flights from four a day to three just a week after the introduction of these flights pointed towards omission of statistics. It contributed to the harassment of the passengers.

Majority of the travel agents said airline passengers for England and other destinations in Europe had switched over to private airlines, while the travellers for Toronto had no choice but to board the AI’s hub-and-spoke flight. 

New Delhi, November 17
Finding itself on the back foot in the wake of the damning Comptroller and Auditor General’s (CAG) report on the 2G spectrum allocation in 2008, which had start-up telecom firms emerging as possible telecom giants, the Department of Telecom (DoT) may move to cancel the licences then awarded.

With the Supreme Court also keeping an eye on the hasty allocation of the licences by the former Communication and IT minister A Raja and also questioning the role of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, officials said it would be no surprise if the government moves to withdraw the licences.

Some of the firms which had been granted licences on first-come-first-serve basis are yet to start their operations. The terms and conditions stated that operations had to commence within 12 months of granting of the licence.

There is every likelihood that the initial licence fee of the erring companies would be forfeited. Their licences are also likely to revoked and penalty fee sought.

Reports suggest that DoT has conveyed to the CAG that it is considering issuing a show-cause notices to these 85 companies, which is likely to be a prelude to the termination of their licences.

Among the companies found to be ineligible are eight Unitech group companies, including Infrastructure and Azare Properties, besides Shipping Stop Dotcom, presently Loop Telecom, the Allianz Infratech which merged with Etisalat DB Telecom and Datacom Solutions, now Etisalat DB Telecom.

These licences were given despite the companies not having the stipulated paid-up capital at the time of application. CAG had earlier asked DoT to cancel licences allocated to all ineligible companies and to ask them to apply afresh. 

New Delhi, November 17
The comptroller and Auditor General’s (CAG) report on the 2G spectrum allocation has brought to light that real estate majors - Unitech and Allainz Infratech - misrepresented facts in their applications for getting telecom licences and 2G spectrum.

The CAG report states that the six newly incorporated applicant companies from the Unitech Group submitted applications for grant of 20 licences to the Department of Telecommunications on September 24, 2007.

With their applications, these companies had submitted copies of their Memorandum of Association/ Articles of Association and indicated that they met the eligibility criteria for grant of Unified Access Service (UAS) licences.

On verification, it came to light that all these companies had suppressed the conditional nature of certification of registration with the Registrar of Companies (RoC). While registering on September 20, 2007 they had carried out alterations in the main object clause in the Memorandum of Memorandum of Association/ Articles of Association

“As a result, all these six new companies were registered afresh with with the new names in may 2008 with the RoC... As a result, the Memorandum of Understanding of these companies did not permit them to operate in telecom sector on the date of application i.e., September 24, 2007. Hence, they were ineligible for the grant of UAS licences," the CAG said.

Incidentally, within months of getting the licence Unitech became the first start-up firm to sell its stock in its telecom arm to an international telecom firm Telenor at a whopping profit without having a single subscriber.

While the licences were issued in Januray 2008, in October it announced selling of its 60 per cent stake in the telecom venture for Rs 6,120 crore ($1.23 billion) to Norway-based Telenor.

The deal put the enterprise value of Unitech’s telecom business at a whopping Rs 11,620 crore ($2.35 billion).

According to CAG report, Allianz Infratech, which has now merged with Etisalat, also misrepresented facts while seeking the licence.

It submitted the application for grant of licences in all 21 circles on September 3, 2007 to the DoT without disclosing the fact of non-registration of alteration of the main object clauses in the Memorandum of Association as on the date of application.

"The company had changed the main object clauses in the Memorandum of Association and Association of Articles so as to include the telecom sector... But these alterations were registered by the RoC on September 28 , 2007 only. Thus they were also not eligible for grant of UAS licence on the date of submission of application," it added while pointing out that another 13 companies did not have the requisite authorised share capital on the date of submission of the applications. 

London, November 17
Gold demand is being lifted this year by a recovery in jewellery buying in the key Indian market, and robust growth in Chinese gold consumption, the World Gold Council said on Wednesday.

Releasing its third-quarter Gold Demand Trends report, which showed a 12 percent year-on-year rise in gold demand in the third quarter, the WGC said jewellery consumption in particular looked set to improve on last year's level.

"The main drivers for this year are the impact of the Indian and Chinese markets," said the WGC's research manager Eily Ong. "In 2010 in total, jewellery demand could actually exceed that of 2009."

Concerns over the global economic outlook and currency market stability have supported investment in gold this year, helping it to a record $1,424.10 an ounce last week. But identifiable investment levels are below 2009's stellar levels.

Investment demand almost halved in the third quarter from the previous three months, during which concerns over euro zone sovereign debt levels fuelled a surge in investment in bullion.

But Ong said jitters remain in the wider financial markets, caused by measures such as the United States' quantitative easing policy announced earlier this month, which could still lead to another jump in investment.

"If there is continuing uncertainty over the impact of QE2 and uncertainty over what is happening with the Asian market -- whether they will continue to tighten policy, or whether whatever they are doing now will succeed in curbing inflation -- we could probably see what we saw in Q2 again," said Ong.

"There could be more investors allocating their assets into gold as a store of value, and for capital preservation."

Demand for investment products such as gold exchange-traded funds softened in the third quarter. ETF demand was down 7 percent year-on-year to 38.7 tonnes, less than a seventh of the "exceptional" flows seen in the second quarter.

But other forms of demand rose. Jewellery buying climbed 8 percent to 529.8 tonnes in the last quarter, accounting for 57 percent of total demand. In the second quarter jewellery buying accounted for just 40 percent of overall consumption.

India bought nearly 50 tonnes, or 36 percent, more gold jewellery in the third quarter than in the same period of the previous year, bringing its jewellery consumption in the quarter to 184.5 tonnes.

Greater China meanwhile lifted its gold consumption by 16 percent to 153.7 tonnes. Of that total, its jewellery consumption rose 9 percent to 107.9 tonnes.

"What we see is that in the largest part of gold demand, which is jewellery, a sector that is always sensitive to high gold prices, we continue to see strong appetite," said Ong. “That is a very good, confident signal to investors that the trend in gold prices is not a bubble."

Dental and industrial demand, for applications such as electronics devices, also rose 13 percent to 110.2 tonnes. Ong said the sector had now returned to pre-financial crisis levels.

The official sector remained a net buyer of gold for a sixth successive quarter. Central banks were once major suppliers of bullion to the market, but European bank sales have dried up recently, while many Asian banks have been adding to reserves.

"The reason why the official sector, particularly in these key economies in emerging markets, are actually purchasing gold is the same reason institutional investors or high net worth individuals are buying it," said Ong. — Reuters

Jalandhar, November 17
With natural rubber prices hitting an all-time high - Rs 202 per kg - in the country, prices of all rubber-based items are set to witness 10-15 per cent increase.

Price of bicycle and motorcycle tyres and tubes have already a registered 5-7 per cent increase in the past few weeks. If natural rubber prices remain above Rs 200 per kg for a few more days, the increase in price of rubber goods will be in the range of 10-12 per cent in next few weeks.

“We have already increased the rates of our products by 5-7 per cent in a phased manner during the past two months. If rubber price do not fall, we will have to raies prices 4-5 per cent, before next month,” said Sanjeev Pahwa, CMD, Ralson Tyres, Punjab, one of the world’s leading manufacturers of bicycle and motorcycle’s tyres and tubes.

All these items are manufactured by the micro and small rubber goods industrial units, scattered across north India.

BB Jyoti, president, Rubber Goods Manufacturers’ Association, Jalandhar, said that as only natural rubber consists 33 per cent of the total production cost, 10-15 per cent rise in the price of such items is inevitable. Otherwise, we will have to shut down our units, he said.

“Besides rising demand, another factor behind the hike in natural rubber prices is the cartel, which the rubber producers of the Kerala, the state producing 85-90 percent of the country’s total natural rubber, have allegedly formed, under the patronage of politicians,” said Jyoti.

Usually, industrialists expect natural rubber price to be at at its lowest from October to December, that is called “tapping season” because rubber trees release rubber solution in huge quantity during these month.

“The worst is yet to come as, in the past few years, rubber prices remain around 160 per kg during the tapping season, against Rs 202 this year,” said Jyoti.

Mumbai, November 17
FMCG major Dabur India is betting big on its international business and plans to expand its manufacturing capacity to cater to the growing markets besides readying a slew of products for launch in new categories, a top company official said. Dabur, the fourth largest Indian FMCG firm with an annual turnover of around Rs 3,400 crore, aims to increase its foreign sales substantially to 25 per cent through both inorganic and organic expansion going forward.

Currently, it contributes about 20 per cent to the total turnover at Rs 600-crore (as at end-FY 10).

"We want to be a world player and are open for any strategic acquisition in the near future. However, to drive growth, we also have to increase capacity constantly. This fiscal, we will invest around Rs 60-crore in expanding our manufacturing facilities — one each in Egypt and Nigeria and two in the Gulf," Dabur (India) Chief Financial Officer S Raghunathan said on the sidelines of a CII event here today.

He said that international business was growing at a CAGR of 22-30 per cent and is expected to grow at the same number over the next few years.

Dabur manufactures oral-care, hair-care and several other personal-care products in these units and plans to scale-up production as it expands its foot-print across the globe. — PTI