WIPO to back India on IPRs
NEW DELHI, Feb 8 — Two independent advisory commissions have been set up in the World Intellectual Property Organisation to look into the complementaries between the government, private sector and global organisations.

Fertiliser production meets target
NEW DELHI, Feb 8 — The estimated production of fertilisers during December 1998, was 9.96 lakh tonnes of nitrogen and 2.94 lakh tonnes of phosphate with the capacity utilisation for nitrogen being 113.6 per cent and 111.2 per cent for phosphate.

FDI to boost housing
NEW DELHI, Feb 8 — The government has opened up the infrastructure sector for foreign direct investment to boost housing and construction activities in the country, Union Urban Affairs Minister Ram Jethmalani today said.

IBM targets medium companies
CHANDIGARH, Feb 8 — Tata IBM showcased a wide range of technologies targeting small and medium businesses in Chandigarh today. The event, convened by senior executives and experts from Tata IBM, had on display the IBM Netfinity range of PC servers, IBMs desktop computers and Thinkpad mobile computers.

Govt financial data on Internet
Tribune News Service

NEW DELHI, Feb 8 — The Union Finance Minister, Mr Yashwant Sinha, said today the states would be persuaded to open their accounts to public scrutiny as in the case of the Central Government.

Mr Sinha was speaking at the inauguration of a website for the office of the Controller General of Accounts and the release of monthly financial data on Central Government operations on the Internet. He released the financial data for the first nine months of the current year ending December 31, 1998.

Mr Sinha said this was a big leap forward in the direction of greater transparency in government accounting.

He said providing more and more information to the people at large who do not have access and opportunities would ensure that they are not exploited by the elite. The Minister, however, cautioned that transparency was a double-edged weapon and those who use the information should be more responsible.

India, which is a voluntary subscriber to “special data dissemination standards (SDDS)’’ of the IMF along with a number of other member countries, will now need to release the fiscal sector data on Central Government operations to the public every month, says an official release.

The data for a given month will be released by the end of the following month. Accordingly, the office of Controller General of Accounts, the Department of Expenditure and the Ministry of Finance, will release financial data every month starting from accounts of the month of December, 1998, on the Internet.

Not a harsh Budget: Sinha

NEW DELHI, Feb 8 (PTI) — Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha today clarified that he had never said that the coming Budget would be harsh but only indicated there were no soft options. Speaking to reporters after inaugurating website for the office of Controller General of Accounts here, Sinha said: “I never said that it will be a harsh Budget. I only said that there are no soft options. I said it may be a hard Budget but did not say it will be a harsh Budget”. Sinha appealed to the “responsible” media persons to judiciously use information provided on the Internet and the website on the state of the economy and not to create panic by highlighting temporary mismatches that could occur.

Working group for weak banks

MUMBAI, Feb 8 (PTI) — The RBI has decided to set up a working group to suggest measures for revival of weak public sector banks.

A six-member committee under the chairmanship of M.S. Verma, adviser to the RBI and former Chairman of the State Bank of India, would develop criteria for identification of weak public sector banks, study the problems and undertake a case by case examination to pick the potentially viable ones, the RBI said in a statement here today.

The group would also be required to suggest a strategic plan of financial, organisational and operational restructuring for weak banks, the RBI said.

The other members of the committee are, Chairman of Vysya Bank K.R. Ramamurthy, former President of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India M.M. Chitale, Managing Director of Investment Credit Rating Agency P.K. Choudhury, former RBI Executive Director J.R. Prabhu and former Director of Indian Management Institute, Dr Sushil Chandra.

The College of Agricultural Banking of the RBI with introduce a special training programme for personnel working in financial companies (NBFCs).

The objective of the training programme would be to familiarise the dealing officials of the NBFCs with the regulatory framework of the RBI.

The programme would familiarise the participants with the Reserve Bank directions on acceptance of deposits for equipment leasing companies, hire-purchase finance companies, loan companies, investment companies and residuary non-banking companies as also RBI guidelines on asset classification, income recognition, provision for bad and doubtful debts, capital adequacy, the RBI said.

The programme would initially be offered to personnel of those NBFs with deposits of Rs 20 crore and above, the apex bank added in a statement here today.

WIPO to back India on IPRs
Tribune News Service

NEW DELHI, Feb 8 — Two independent advisory commissions have been set up in the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) to look into the complementaries between the government, private sector and global organisations.

Addressing a meeting organised by the Institute of Intellectual Property Development (IIPD) in collaboration with FICCI here today, the Director General of WIPO Dr Kamal Idris said that these two commissions will play a dominant role in the restructuring of the WIPO.

Dr Idris said that India would be given full support for protection of intellectual property rights and India has to play a key role in the restructuring of the WIPO.

Dr Idris said that globalisation does not mean marginalisation of small economies. It means the works of the mind must be shared by all people and the process of transfer should benefit everyone within internationally agreed principles. There is a need at the moment for demystification of the IPRs as it is no longer purely legislative process.The demystification is needed at the grassroots levels amongst school, technology, small scale enterprises etc.

Secretary in the Department of Industrial Development, Dr S. Narayan said that the government has sanctioned $ 18 million for modernisation of the patent office.This will involve not only physical infrastructure but also restructure a large number of people.

Markfed complex set up in Amritsar
Tribune News Service

AMRITSAR, Feb 8 — For the next kharif season, Markfed will arrange well in time DAP and urea in sufficient quantity to meet the demand of the cooperative societies.

Addressing a public meeting after the inauguration of the Markfed district complex here today, Mr Ranjit Singh Brahmpura, Cooperation Minister, Punjab, said that the requirement of the cooperative sector for the kharif was expected to be 40,000 MTs of DAP and 3 lakh MTs of urea which may be allotted to Markfed.

IFFCO and KRIBHCO would also supply fertilisers to the cooperative societies. He clarified that earlier too the entire demand of the cooperative sector was met by Markfed alone.

Though paddy procurement was not a profitable intervention, Markfed entered the market and purchased maximum paddy to give farmers remunerative prices, he said.

Markfed exported various items of processed food amounting to Rs 497.16 lakh and introduced certain new items.

Mr Jagdish Walia, Chairman, and Mr G.S. Sandhu, MD Markfed, also highlighted activities of Markfed.

Fertiliser production meets target
Tribune News Service

NEW DELHI, Feb 8 — The estimated production of fertilisers during December 1998, was 9.96 lakh tonnes of nitrogen and 2.94 lakh tonnes of phosphate with the capacity utilisation for nitrogen being 113.6 per cent and 111.2 per cent for phosphate.

The cumulative production of fertilisers since April-December 1998, was 78.41 lakh tonnes of nitrogen against the target of 79.57 lakh tonnes and 22.70 lakh tonnes of phosphate, which met the target. The cumulative production in the corresponding period in the previous year was 73.60 lakh tonnes of nitrogen and 22.11 lakh tonnes of phosphate.

The availability of urea during the period under review has been satisfactory throughout the country with 18.98 lakh tonne of urea being despatched to the States during December as against the target of 17.50 lakh tonnes.

The cumulative availability of urea by the end of December, 1998, has been 76.10 lakh tonnes as compared to 73.61 lakh tonnes during the corresponding period of last year. This constitutes 66 per cent of the estimated requirement of 115.77 lakh tonnes for the season.

The cumulative availability of DAP at 25.10 lakh tonnes and MOP at 8.98 lakh tonnes at the end of December 1998, was higher by 23 per cent and eight per cent respectively over the availability of 20.44 lakh tonnes of DAP and 8.32 lakh tonnes of MOP during the corresponding period in the previous year.

FDI to boost housing

NEW DELHI, Feb 8 (PTI) — The government has opened up the infrastructure sector for foreign direct investment (FDI) to boost housing and construction activities in the country, Union Urban Affairs Minister Ram Jethmalani today said.

“Anybody is free to make profit, but we want them to plough back a part of the profit to remove poverty, malnutrition and disease afflicting the country,” he said, inaugurating a three-day international seminar here on “financing and pricing of urban infrastructure”.

He said urban infrastructural bottlenecks were posing serious problems which needed to be sorted out as early as possible as the government had a constitutional commitment to remove poverty notwithstanding its policy of globalisation and free market.

Over 150 delegates from 15 countries are participating in the seminar being organised by Human Settlement Management Institute of state-owned Housing and Urban Development Corporation (HUDCO).

IBM targets medium companies
Tribune News Service

CHANDIGARH, Feb 8 — Tata IBM showcased a wide range of technologies targeting small and medium businesses in Chandigarh today.

The event, convened by senior executives and experts from Tata IBM, had on display the IBM Netfinity range of PC servers, IBMs desktop computers and Thinkpad mobile computers.

The IBM Solutions Forum displayed IBMs PC product solutions, IBM servers, industry-specific solutions, and electronic business solutions.

Ashish Kumar, Country Manager, Small and Medium Business Group, Tata IBM Limited, said: “The issues that are relevant to companies internationally are now equally relevant to Indian organisations as they become globally competitive”.

The IBM Solutions Forum also demonstrated how companies could use the Internet and intranets to improve their marketing, customer service and sales functions.

Another IBM outfit, the IBM Consulting Group organised a seminar on “Competitive challenges and how to address them using world class best practices and information Technology”, for CEOs here today.

The seminar was addressed by Mr Sanjiva Shankar Dubey, Principal and Head of the IBM Consulting Group in India.

The group has worked with several major & medium sector clients in Ludhiana, Gurgaon, Noida and Delhi in this region.

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Debt recovery
Tribune News Service
CHANDIGARH, Feb 8 — The Haryana Chamber of Commerce and Industry has criticised the move to amend the Debt Recovery Tribunal Act, to give power to the presiding officer to attach property of an alleged debtor before judgement. In a statement here today the chamber said the powers proposed to be given to the presiding officer were bad in law because in most of the cases banks and financial institutions made the case before the tribunal as per their own perceptions, whereas the recovery amount was the subject matter of dispute.

L & T Info
Mumbai, Feb 8 (PTI) — L&T Information Technology Limited, a wholly owned subsidiary of Larsen & Toubro Limited and distributors of Seagate products in India, today announced the launch of “Seagate Info 7” in India. An integrated suite of business intelligence (BI) tools, “Seagate Info 7” is built on a proven and scalable architecture that enables users to analyse and reliably share information across the enterprise, Bernie Cairelli, Managing Director, South Asia Seagate Software Inc, said at the launch of the product here.

TTK Prestige
NEW DELHI, Feb 8 (UNI) — TTK Prestige has recorded a net profit of Rs 6.68 crore in the first nine months of the current fiscal as against a net profit of Rs 5 crore in the entire 1997-98 financial year. For the quarter ended December 31, 1998, the company’s income stood at Rs 38 crore, the pre-tax profit for the quarter amounted to Rs 2.63 crore.

Andhra pact
HYDERABAD, Feb 8 (PTI) — Andhra Pradesh today set in motion the process of electronic governance by signing an agreement with United Telecom Limited (UTL) to set up a state wide area network (APSWAN) to serve as a basic information highway connecting various state departments. Under the Rs 22 crore project, to be implemented on build own and operate (BOO) basis, the state secretariat here would be linked to 25 locations across the state by May 15.

CII conference
NEW DELHI, Feb 8 (PTI) — Videotaped addresses of Mr Bill Clinton and Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee will be the major highlights of a four-day CII conference on “Building a worldwide movement for democracy”, beginning on February 14 here. The speakers include Nobel laureate Amartya Sen, Mr I.K. Gujral and Dr Manmohan Singh.

HUDA plots
Tribune News Service
CHANDIGARH, Feb 8 — HUDA has authorised Union Bank of India to accept applications for Sector 38 Gurgaon plots with the Sector 21-C branch acting as the controlling branch.