Saturday, August 21, 1999
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B U S I N E S S | Saturday, August 21, 1999 |
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No hike in taxes if voted
to power: FM
Flight of billions of dollars from
Russia |
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Mirc declares 35 pc
interim CII forms task force Omni, 800 get Maruti bread &
butter German giant to buy Metro tyres |
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No hike in taxes if voted to power: FM LONDON, Aug 20 (PTI) — Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha has said that he will not raise taxes if voted back to power. Participating in BBC World’s “India Business Report” programme, Sinha spoke on the need for tax reforms and measures to widen the tax net as a means of tackling the Budget deficit. He said if the BJP was voted back to power, it would strive to have a national consensus in Parliament on a Fiscal Deficit Act. Sinha said his Government was committed to bringing down government holding in public sector undertakings to 24 per cent in non-priority areas. Stating that he was in favour of the Disinvestment Commission being completely in charge of the process of disinvestment, he said “perhaps there is a need to give more powers to the Disinvestment Commission so that it could not only make the recommendations but also help the Government in the process of disinvestment, or execute the disinvestment.” According to a BBC release, Sinha took a bet that he would not raise taxes. When challenged by one of the panellists Ashok Desai, a leading economist, that he would be prepared to bet that in the next Budget that Sinha would increase taxes significantly, the Finance Minister replied “I will bet against you on that. If I am around, I take a bet.” The other panellists included Robert Gibson, Country Head at Jardine Fleming India, Jayati Ghosh, Professor of Economics at Jawaharlal Nehru University and Tarun Das, Director General of the CII. In a separate episode of the Indian Business Report, facing the same panellists, former Finance Minister Manmohan Singh said if voted back to power the Congress would hope to “bring the fiscal deficit to no more than 3 per cent in three years.” Singh said the Congress would “aim to reduce the fiscal deficit of the combined State and Central Governments from the present levels of 10 per cent of our GDP to no more than 5 per cent of our GDP in a period of three to four years.” Stressing the need for a better fiscal administration, Singh said the Congress would enact a “Fiscal Responsibility Act to ensure that the fiscal system of the country is managed prudently.” Tax reforms, he said, would continue to be emphasised. Asked about the Congress policy on disinvestment and privatisation of government enterprises, Singh said his party “does not believe in privatisation as a panacea for everything.” The former Finance Minister said his party would provide all possible encouragement to those public sector enterprises which could be run efficiently and profitably. At the same time “we would encourage them to go to the market to raise their resources,” he said. The programme featuring
Singh would be telecast next Sunday and Sinha would
figure in the episode on August 29, the release said. |
Housing
loan scheme launched CHANDIGARH, Aug 20 — The Punjab Governor and UT Administrator, Lieut-Gen B.K.N. Chhibber (Retd), today launched the "HUDCO Niwas", the individual housing loan scheme of Housing and Urban Development Corporation Limited, at the CII Convention Centre , Sector 31, here. General Chhibber informed that the foundation stone of the 5,000 EWS, LIG and MIG dwelling units to be built by the Chandigarh Housing Board with the assistance of HUDCO would be laid soon. Expressing concern that about one-thirds of the population of a planned city like Chandigarh lived in slums, he was of the view that no financial institution should charge more than 1.5 per cent above the bank rate for any limit of housing loan and the highest rate of interest for highest bracket of loan should not be more than 12 per cent. General Chhibber also presented letters of sanction to 12 beneficiaries covering a diverse cross-section of economic and employment backgrounds. Earlier, the Chairman and Managing Director of HUDCO, Mr V. Suresh, indicated that retail lending window of HUDCO for providing housing loans to individuals throughout the country would provide a package of services, besides access to loans on easy and affordable terms. He specifically referred to the most-competitive facet of interest burden of the scheme due to the methodology for interest circulation on a monthly rest basis as against annuity rest and waiver of the last two instalments for servicing of all earlier monthly repayments on time. Giving details, Mr Suresh said that the individual loan being offered by HUDCO either for building a house, purchasing a built-up house or flat, acquiring a plot or extending the existing dwelling unit up to Rs 15 lakh was available at the rate ranging from 11.5 to 14.75 per cent. A seminar on "Building centre movement — a cost-effective technology back-up services for housing and building delivery" was also held. In the interaction between HUDCO officials and representatives of various building centres, presentation were made by the successful building centres. The problems and constraints being faced by these building centres were identified and possible solutions and ways and means to make the centres fully functional suggested. MUMBAI, Aug 20 (UNI) — The Board of Directors of Mirc Electronics LTD, the manufacturers of Onida brand of television has proposed an interim dividend of 35 per cent for the year 1999-2000. The company has recommended a dividend of 65 per cent for the year ended March 31, 1999 with the book closure being August 25 September 23, 1999, the shareholders thus would have a dividend cheque at a rate of 100 per cent, a company release said here today. According to Mirc Chairman G.L. Mirchandani, the proposed dividend is one of the many initiatives taken by the company in enhancing shareholder value he pointed out that Mirc would announce a “dividend philosophy” at its annual general meeting scheduled on September 23. For the first quarter
ended June 30, 1999, Mirc has posted a net sales of Rs
182.33 crores and net profit of Rs 7.51 crore which is a
jump of 34 per cent and 136 per cent respectively over
the corresponding period of the previous year. |
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TOKYO, Aug 20 (AP) — Three Japanese banks today announced a broad alliance plan that will create the world’s largest banking group, with assets of well over $ 1 trillion. Officials of Dai chi Kangyo Bank Ltd., Industrial Bank of Japan Ltd. and Fuji Bank Ltd confirmed at a news conference the broad alliance plans to be implemented over the next two years. Assets at the three banks exceed $ 1.2 trillion, which will make the new entity the largest banking group in the world. Their assets will surpass the $ 735.3 billion of Germany’s Deutsche Bank and the $ 652 billion of Japan’s largest bank, the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi. “ We aspire to be a
powerful player in the global market,” said IBJ
President Masao Nishimura. |
Flight of billions of dollars from Russia NEW YORK, Aug 20 (PTI) — Billions of dollars have been channelled through the Bank of New York in the last year in what is believed to be a major money laundering operation by Russian organised crime, The New York Times has reported. From October through March some $ 4.2 billion, in more than 10,000 transactions, passed through one account, the newspaper yesterday said, quoting law enforcement officials. But because the account has remained open to help a continuing probe by the federal authorities, investigators estimate that as much as $ 10 billion may have flowed through the bank in that account and related ones since early last year. The investigators said
the transactions seem to add up to one of the largest
money laundering operations ever uncovered in the USA,
with vast sums of money moving in and out of the bank in
a day. |
CII forms
task force CHANDIGARH, Aug 20
— The CII will help the Himachal Pradesh Government
in attracting investments in the power sector. This was
stated here today by Mr A.R. Singh, Chairman, CII
Himachal Pradesh State Council at the first meeting of
the CII panel on hydel power, A five member task force,
headed by Mr Ashok Tandon, has been constituted to aid
the Government in creating a congenial environment for
the smooth functioning of the power sector. |
German
giant to buy Metro tyres NEW DELHI, Aug 20 — German tyre major, Continental AG, has decided to source cycle tyres and tubes from Punjab-based Metro Tyres. An agreement has been signed by the two parties and the entire production from the new unit of the Ludhiana plant of Metro will be exported to Europe, the USA and Canada under the Continental brand name. The tyres to be rolled out from the new plant will be manufactured to the European and the US market specifications which will be of lighter weight and will have a longer durability than those available in India. While in India the average life of a tyre is nine months, those which are going to be exported would have an average life of three years. Metro Tyres is, at present, exporting cycle tyres and tubes worth Rs 15 crore to around 30 countries in America, Europe, West Asia, Africa and Latin America. The off-take agreement with Continental is expected to fetch an additional export income of Rs 10 crore for the company in the current financial year. “Export income is expected to go up to Rs 40 crore by 2004”, Managing Director of Metro Tyres Rummy Chhabra told The Tribune. As per the agreement, Continental will buy one million tyres and tubes from Metro in the first year and the quantity will go up to four million by 2004. Continental AG has an agreement with the Modi group for sourcing of car tyres and tubes whereas, Apollo and JK had similar agreements with General Tyres. According to the Chairman of Metro Tyres, Mr Man Singh the tyres to be exported to Continental will be manufactured at its new unit Ludhiana which is being set up with an investment of Rs 40 crore. The state-of-the-art plant for the new unit has been imported from Trelleborg of Sweden, which is expected to start commercial production by September this year. The new plant will increase the company’s installed capacity by 50,000 units per day. The existing three units in Ludhiana already have an installed capacity of 1,00,000 tyres and tubes per day. Metro tyres currently
has an annual production of 2.25 crore bicycle tyres and
tubes and enjoys a market share of 25 per cent in the
domestic market.Its clientele includes Hero Cycles,
Atlas, RMI and Avon. |
Omni, 800
get Maruti bread & butter NEW DELHI, Aug 20 — Swamped by competition and challenged by new technology, Maruti Udyog Limited still hopes to remain a market champion, thanks to its old war horse Maruti-800 and the Omni. The reason: no car-maker can manufacture a passenger vehicle cheaper than the highest selling model in the country. It costs Maruti Udyog around $ 3000 equivalent to produce a standard “peoples” car, the cheapest in the world. The market rate is of course higher by around 55 per cent as the percentage accounts for the host of taxes and levies. Mr Jagdish Khattar, the new Managing Director of Maruti Udyog Ltd, today told newspersons here that the company would be updating the existing models to make them Euro II compliant before April next year. He admitted that the upgradation of the existing model would involve more costs but it has yet not been decided how much of the increased cost would be passed on to the consumer. With around 33 million two-wheeler owners in the country, Maruti hopes that its standard model would be the entry car for this class of consumers. He refused to spell out the company’s plans on the introducing new models, which are expected this year end, but said Maruti would have a presence in every segment, right from the lowest rung of the cost ladder to the highest. Small cars, luxury cars, mid-segment luxury cars and multiutility vehicles would form part of the Maruti stable. He also assured that the future models would have state-of-the art technology and would be contemporary product. MUL has targeted a sales figure of 4,00,000 vehicles by the end of the current fiscal as against around 3,30,000 units in 1998-99. Mr Khattar said production of Maruti-800 and Omni models would be pegged at around 2,50,000 units per annum. Another model from the Maruti stable that is highly popular in the Indian roads is the Zen and the company is finding it difficult to cope with demand. With a production of more than 80,000 vehicles per annum, Mr Khattar said it was difficult to expand production capacity of this model. Mr Khattar said the
company had a market share of around 80 per cent today
but over a period, as the market expands with
competition, the figure would come down. He said a market
share of even 40 per cent in a country was good enough
and he was confident that Maruti would be unbeatable
during the years to come. |
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NEW DELHI, Aug 20 (PTI) — Maruti Udyog Ltd will launch a new variant of its popular 1000 cc car Zen named as “Zen Classic” here on Monday. The new Zen will be Euro-I compliant with a classic look and improved interiors, company sources said. The “Classic” model will be slightly costlier than existing LX and VX models, carrying a price tag of Rs 2.89 lakh (ex-showroom, Delhi) and Rs 3.40 lakh, respectively. The head and rear lamps
of the new model will have different designs. The
interiors will also be different with new seats and a
different dash board. |
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