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| Tuesday,
October 3, 2000, Chandigarh, India   
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Assocham for
relaxing laws on layoffs NABARD to prepare plan
for murrah project Chautala’s Japan visit from Oct 7 BHEL, HMT post negative
growth rate Trade deficit rises ‘Withdraw diesel hike’ |
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NSE ready with options trade Need to ease sales tax rules in Haryana
Assocham for relaxing laws on layoffs NEW DELHI, Oct 2 (PTI) — The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry (Assocham) today asked the government to relax labour laws relating to layoffs and exit of weak companies in order to make Indian companies competitive. “The restrictive laws relating to layoffs and exit of weak companies coupled with low labour productivity have not only rendered
Indian companies uncompetitive vis-a-vis other Asian countries but have severely affected the growth of employment in the organised sector,” the chamber said in a statement here. Drawing parallel with other booming economies of Asia, the chamber said that unlike in India Government approval for layoffs, retrenchment and closure was not required in Korea, Singapore, Indonesia and Thailand. “Exit of weak companies and retrenchment is common. Unions do not go on strike on these issues because such a course would result in further deterioration of competitive position of the company and lead to more retrenchment,” it said. Stating that loss making units including sick companies were required to pay bonus to its workers at 8.33 per cent in India, Assocham said payment of bonus in other countries depend upon profits, and allowances are linked to productivity. Asian economies like Korea and Japan have a system of company-wise union rather than economy-wide or industry-wide union as in India, it said adding unlike industry-wide unions, a union for the company generally restricts outsiders. Stating that intervention of government through trade unions in enterprise level disputes was harming Indian industry, Assocham said intervention and union functioning on the other hand had created an indisciplined and difficult to supervise labour force. Stating that Indian labour market was considered highly rigid, the chamber underlined the need to devise ways to use more labour, rather than capital, which was already scarce but liberally used. While the present laws on retrenchment and closure were restrictive in nature, state intervention and judicial pronouncements had become a stumbling block, the release. |
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NABARD to prepare plan
for murrah project CHANDIGARH, Oct 2 — Haryana’s famous “murrah” breed of buffalo is all set to be targeted for commercial breeding through an ambitious pilot project being launched in Punjab and Haryana. The project, aimed at increasing the number of good quality milch animals in the region will be initially launched in six districts — Sangrur, Ludhiana and Amritsar (Punjab) and Hisar, Kurukshetra and Karnal (Haryana) . “Breeding practices in both states really need improvement. Not only has murrah breed deteriorated in the past 25 years, but there has also been gradual deterioration of animal health, milk yield, feeding standards and also sanitation standards”, said NABARD officials . Total financial outlay for the project (for three years) has been estimated to be Rs 686.16 lakh. In both states, 30 units (each unit containing 20 milch animals) will be set up each year up to three years. Experts believe that the project, which will later be replicated in Punjab and Haryana, will fulfil the demand of quality milk in the two highest milk producing states in the country by catering to a large number of private and public milk plants. It will also help in providing gainful employment to under-employed progressive farmers, dairy cattle breeders and rural educated youth. While NABARD will prepare banking plan for the project, advise the state government for extending the required technical support and also constitute a committee to monitor the progress of implementation of the project, the technical inputs and training facilities will be provided by the National Dairy Research Institute of India (NDRI), Karnal, PAU, Ludhiana. The Departments of Animal Husbandry and Dairy Development in both states will be the nodal agencies in identifying the beneficiaries , and helping in arranging for the training programmes. The project aims to create a bank of good quality germ plasm by making progeny tested bulls available for increasing productivity of buffaloes in Punjab and Haryana. As per the plans, farmers or educated youth or entrepreneurs who are willing to undergo training prior to implementation of the scheme will be identified as beneficiaries for the project by animal husbandry and dairy development Directorates in both states. As far as the feeding is concerned, the beneficiaries will have to give an undertaking for earmarking some portion of land for the production of green fodder (one acre for 5-6 buffaloes). Good quality breeding bulls or their semen straws will be provided to all buffalo breeding units under the scheme for the production of next generation. Inbreeding will be avoided and low producing buffaloes will be replaced by young generation, based on milk records. During later stages, after identifying the top-ranked buffaloes will be mated with top-ranked bulls for production of elite progeny. On the basis of lactation flow chart and maximum daily milk production of the dairy unit, necessary equipments, including milking pails, milk cans, chaff-cutter with motor, will be provided. A milking machine set may also be considered to be provided in some cases. The project will be supervised and monitored periodically by the implementing bank under regular intimation to NABARD every six months. |
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Chautala’s Japan visit from Oct 7 CHANDIGARH, Oct 2 — Haryana Chief Minister Om Prakash Chautala and his entourage will leave the state on October 7 for a ten-day trip of South-East Asian countries to woo investors for setting up their units in Haryana. The team will go to Japan, South Korea and Singapore. The team will meet the chiefs of Suzuki Motors and Honda Motors in Japan. In Singapore the delegation will interact with expatriate Indians. IT units, export-oriented units and automobile parts manufacturing units are among the five thrust areas for which the team will seek investment. Meanwhile, in a press note issued here today, the Ambala-based Haryana Exporters Association has welcomed the Chief Minister’s decision to visit the countries for industrial investments. A large number of investors in Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia and Australia would be interested in setting up units in India in different sectors because a labour is cheap here, the press note said and added that the investors would also be interested in setting up joint ventures with Indian manufacturers. |
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BHEL, HMT
post negative growth rate NEW
DELHI, Oct 2 (PTI) — Negative growth performance by Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd (bhel), Heavy Engineering Corporation (HEC) and
HMT reflected heavily in the 7.96 per cent negative growth rate recorded by
PSUS during the first five months of the current fiscal. While bhel posted a negative growth rate of 18.22 per cent, Bangalore-based
HMT recorded a negative growth rate of 15.31 per cent, according to latest production figures released by Department of Heavy Industries. Cummulative production performance of
PSUS during the review period was 7.96 per cent lower at Rs 3224.08 crore as against Rs 3514.51 crore of the previous year. Engineering registered a 11.14 per cent negative growth rate at Rs 2616.72 crore in the first five months of 2000-01 as against Rs 2944.87 crore of the previous year. Bhel achieved about 93 per cent of the targeted production of Rs 1669 crore during April-August 2000, which was over 18 per cent lower than the Rs 1894 crore production achieved during the same period last year. HMT's
production slipped 15.31 per cent to Rs 219.83 crore as compared to Rs 259.56 crore in April-August 1999-2000. Hec performance fell 44.66 per cent to Rs 48.89 crore as against Rs 88.35 crore in April-August 1999-2000. Unlike engineering units, the non-engineering
PSUS posted a near 7 per cent growth rate at Rs 427.46 crore during the period under review as compared to Rs 399.61 crore achieved in the same period during 1999-2000. |
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NEW DELHI, Oct 2 (ANI) — The trade deficit widened to $ 4.29 billion in the five months ended August compared to $ 3.39 billion during the same period a year ago. The reason adduced for the increase is more than 90 per cent jump in oil imports, according to government sources. During the period imports grew by 20.51 per cent to $ 21.74 billion as against $ 18.04 billion a year earlier. It was largely fuelled by a 91.65 per cent rise in oil imports to $ 6.90 billion. In the corresponding period previous year was $ 3.60 billion. Non-oil imports in the period grew by 2.78 per cent and were estimated at $ 14.84 billion. On the other hand, exports grew by about 23.7 per cent and stood at $ 17.4 billion compared with $ 14.1 in the corresponding period last year. Experts picked up in August after faltering in July. |
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‘Withdraw diesel hike’ NEW DELHI, Oct 2 — The All-India Motor Transport Congress (AIMTC) today urged the government to withdraw the diesel hike as the industry was already passing through recession. The AIMTC said they would observe one day hunger strike on October 10 and if the government fails to withdraw the hike, they would suspend their work from November 3, a release said. The oil pool deficit is Rs 23, 600 crore and the Centre had decided to pass on 33 per cent of the deficit to the consumer. The Motor Congress said the government has not succeeded in its efforts because the states have refused to reduce the sales tax. Moreover, the government had reduced the excise duty on petrol by 50 per cent but in case of diesel the reduction was only 25 per cent. |
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NEW DELHI, Oct 2 (PTI) — National Stock Exchange is awaiting SEBI green signal for starting trade in index options, the second derivative product after index futures, by this fiscal. “We are ready with the necessary software for options trade in the exchange. The exchange is waiting for the SEBI signal,” NSE Vice-President M.L. Soneji told PTI here. The software for options trade is being developed by NSE’s software arm NSE. IT and Tata Consultancy Services. The market regulator has already allowed trading in futures in NSE and Bombay Stock Exchange from June this year. NSE has gone a step forward to introduce Nifty futures trade in Singapore Stock Exchange last month. A SEBI committee on derivatives, headed by J.R. Varma, is currently drawing up the regulation of risk containment for options as well as covered warrants on individual stocks. Mr Soneji said NSE, in the meantime, is carrying out investor awareness programmes through open houses in all major cities, to boost the derivatives trade in India. “The response on Nifty futures has been more pronounced in Singapore than in India primarily because of the greater awareness of investors in that country,” Mr Soneji said. There were 97 contracts for Nifty futures amounting to $ 2.42 million, which was five times the value of Nifty contracts in India on the opening day on September 25. The main driver of the Nifty futures in Singapore has been FIIs who now have the opportunity of arbitrage between the two bourses”, R. Sundaraman, Assistance Vice-President and heading NSE’s derivatives segment said. NSE is also engaged in the process of developing a system of portfolio margining of products to find out the ultimate risk. This would help investors to hedge risk. The exchange would soon move over to rolling settlement system, he said. |
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Need to ease sales tax rules in Haryana THE provisions contained in sub-section (4) of Section 19 of the Haryana General Sales Tax Act, 1973, read with rule 13 of the Haryana General Sales Tax Rules, 1975, relating to renewal of registration certificates have come to be
known as most absurd and meaningless law in the present context. As per the existing scheme of the Act, the period of validity of new registration certificate which is issued to the registrable assesses is five years and the same becomes renewable thereafter. This requirement of law of getting the registration certificates renewed serves practically no purpose more than keeping the record-keepers constantly busy in placing the application form in safe custody which is required to be submitted under rule 13 for the purpose of renewal. Let us have a look at the relevant provisions of law which provide for renewal of registration certificates, in order to find out whether the exercise involving the renewal really serves any purpose for the revenue? Clause (b) of rule 13 of the Haryana General Sales Tax Rules, 1975, which was brought on the statute book in exercise of the powers conferred by sub-section (4) of Section 19 of the Haryana General Sales Tax Act, 1973, lays down “every registration certificate granted under sub-section (2) of section 19 or section 20 of the Act, on or after April 1, 1983, unless cancelled or surrendered, shall remain valid for a period of five years from the date of its grant, but not after March 31 preceding the expiry of the said period of five years. Every registered dealer, who continues to be liable to pay tax under the Act, shall submit to the appropriate assessing authority along with the certificate of registration and copies thereof for the branches, if any, application in form ST-I affixed with a court fee stamps Re 1 or accompained by treasury receipt or bank draft on a local bank for Re 1 on account of fee for the renewal of the registration certificate by March 1 of the year of expiry of the certificates......” What is significant to note here is that the provisions of law barely require submission of an application from ST-I along with court fee stamps or a treasury receipt of the value of Re 1 as far as renewal is concerned. The particulars contained in form do not speak of more than the particulars regarding name and address of the dealer seeking renewal, nature of business, items required for use in the manufacture of finished goods and for packing purposes, if the applicant happens to be engaged in the business of manufacture and sale of finished products, gross turnover in the immediately preceding year, stock of goods, bank balance and properties owned by the dealer. Interestingly enough, this information already becomes available to the assessing authorities through the periodical returns and the applications seeking amendments to the registration certificates. The question therefore is when the assessing authority becomes frequently aware of the relevant information which is periodically furnished by the registered dealers in the form of returns or the applications seeking amendments to the registration certificates where then remains the necessity of getting the same information through the process of renewal? Obviously this is an exercise in futility. The higher authorities opine that the process of renewal is aimed at weeding out the fictitious and bogus dealers who are not otherwise entitled to continue to be registered under the provisions of law. The question that comes to one’s mind is whether the revenue performs the job of weeding out the fictitious dealers after awaiting for a long period of five years? What is happening in the state is that the application seeking renewal filed by the registered dealers is not usually taken care of. The law requires that every application for renewal shall be accompanied by original registration certificates but these registration certificates are frequently lost in the sales tax offices and never returned to the assessees despite several requests. Even otherwise when the original registration certificates are submitted to the assessing authorities for some amendments these are never returned. |
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Website to provide hotel reservation NEW DELHI, Oct 2 (PTI) — ResNet, which claims to represent the largest number of Indian hotels on the Airline reservation systems — has launched resnetindia.com to enable business travellers and tourists to get confirmed room reservation at the click of a mouse. Unveiling version 2 of its web enabled service, ResNet Director B. Chatterjee said, “resnetindia.com is a true online facility where any person surfing the net and looking for a hotel could select a hotel, pay for it online and exit with a confirmed hotel voucher, in less than six clicks.” He said the website’s user friendly vendor interface allowed ResNet’s member hotel and car vendors to online manage their information, provide availability, confirm bookings, update tariff etc.” “ResNet is the enabling partner for domestic hotel reservations on rediff.com, indya.com. sify.com, indiainfo.com and other portals and soon expects to provide service to indiatimes.com, indiatoday.com etc,” Chatterjee said. Over 435 hotels including the Oberoi group, the Clarks group, the Ashok group, Centaur group and Park hotels participate with ResNet on the Global Distribution Systems — more popularly known as the Airline Reservation Systems. 6 portals join hands to boost e-commerce NEW DELHI, Oct 2 (PTI) — India-specific portal Go4i.com today announced a tie-up with five other online companies to jointly offer credit cards, consumer durables and other items for e-commerce. The portal has joined hands with Apnaloan, Investmart, Fabmart, Buyasone and Elbee and the total investment in this venture would be Rs 2 crore, a senior Go4i.com official said here. “Under this promotion, the partners will issue 5000-10,000 credit cards online every month, constitutiong 4-8 per cent of the total market, in addition to a variety of other products like consumer durables and books besides online trading,” Chief Executive Officer of G04i.com Piyush Gupta said. Consumers can have a free trading account on these sites to shop for a whole range of consumer durables and books. Credit for the purpose will be available at Apnaloan.com. Loans would also be available for housing and education. With facilities like loans and credit cards being made available Gupta expects the concept of online shopping to gain ground in the near future. Gupta said the idea behind the tie-up was to benefit from each others’ expertise in various fields of e-commerce. With the participation of Investmart in the deal he expected the investors to get used to trading of shares on the Net. As part of the deal, Elbee would facilitate the entire logistics effort, helping customers of one site to benefit from the facilities offered by the rest, he added. E-com business to touch Rs 1000 cr CALCUTTA, Oct 2 (PTI) — Volume of e-commerce transactions is expected to touch Rs 1000 crore by the year 2002, a study prepared by Nasscom, the apex body for software-driven it industry said in its report. The Nasscom study said that with growing penetration of personal computers in Indian homes and increased desire by corporates to make foray in e-commerce ventures, e-business transactions would increase significantly in the country. Since 1998-99, the volume of e-business transactions were only Rs 131 crore, out of which Rs 119 crore was contributed by b2b transactions and the rest by b2c mode. This volume almost touched Rs 300 crore in 1999-2000, which was expected to touch Rs 450 crore in the current year. The study said that keeping with the global trends, it is expected that e-commerce business would be dominated by b2b transactions. Nasscom said that the real business opportunity is providing software solutions and services in e-business areas in India. The market for providing e-solutions was also expected to fetch an annual revenue of Rs 3000 crore by 2002, the study mentioned. On the Internet survey conducted by Nasscom, it had been estimated that by the end of year 2000, there would be at least 1.5 million Net subscribers and five million Net users across the country. This, according to Nasscom, would easily surpass the standard worldwide account users multiple of 1:2. Commenting upon the present regulatory framework, Nasscom said that it should be more conducive for the proliferation of e-business in India. In this context, it urged the government to support the sector. |
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They, too, have faith in God New Delhi : It was a unique procession, with elephants, horses and camels decked in finery ambling through the streets of a west Delhi neighbourhood. But what made the motley crew really unique were hundreds of dancing and singing eunuchs. But this time, the eunuchs were not heading for celebrations at a wedding or for a home where a baby had just been born — as is the practice in India. They were heading for the inauguration of the first temple in Delhi constructed by a eunuch, Neelam. Neelam built the small temple in the middle of a congested west Delhi neighbourhood with her own money and also parted with Rs. 150,000 to construct a grand statue of Sai Baba of Shirdi. “When others can worship god, why can’t we? We also have our God and we believe in Sai Baba. The temple will not be exclusively for us but for everyone,” said 32-year-old Neelam, wearing a red and white sari with heavy make-up and layers of gold jewellery. The function was attended by eunuchs from Mumbai, Calcutta, Uttar Pradesh and from other parts of the country. Neelam claimed that 1,000 people came from all parts of the country. Information and Broadcasting Minister Sushma Swaraj inaugurated the temple before she was sworn in yesterday as a minister. “I have attended lots of functions but this is different. Nobody should have any problem about who built the temple. They (eunuch) are the ones who bless us,” she said. The temple, which took five years to complete, has been built with white marble brought specially from Jaipur in Rajasthan. Sai Baba’s statue was also made by a Jaipur-based craftsman. The priest, who performed the prayers, was brought from Shirdi. — IANS Cloning goes commercial WASHINGTON : Her chest is broad, her legs and back straight, and she has “an excellent mannary system,” her owner says, Mandy may be one of a kind, but not for long. An exact copy of the champion Holstein cow will be auctioned this week in what is believed to be the first time a farm animal has been cloned for commercial sale. The first calf clone or clones — several now are growing in the wombs of surrogate cattle — are expected to bring $ 50,000 to 100,000 at Friday’s auction at the World Dairy Expo in Madison, Wisconsin, the dairy industry’s biggest trade show. The cloning is a project of Infigen, Inc, an international leader in cloning technology. Infigen, based in DeForest, Wisconsin, owns its own herd of cloned cattle, which are used to produce genetically engineered proteins for pharmaceuticals. Until now, no one has tried to clone the animals for commercial use by farmers and breeders. “The reason it hasn’t been done before is that the technology hasn’t been there to do it,” said Kenneth Olson, a specialist in animal genetics with the American Farm Bureau Federation. Cattle embryos have been cloned before, but no one has made an exact duplicate of an adult cow and put it up for sale, said Xiangzhong Yang, Director of the Transgenic Animal Facility at the University of Connecticut. “The efficiency and cost is a major obstacle,” he said. Research in cloning animals for agricultural purposes has been slow because funds have gone toward pharmaceutical and medical uses of the animals, he said. Infigen’s process involves activating an unfertilised egg by removing the nucleus, fusing the egg with a cell from the same animal’s ear, and then using a chemical compound to trigger a release of calcium that causes the egg to divide and grow; the resulting embryo is implanted in a surrogate cow. Infigen expects to charge about $ 25,000 per clone. But company officials believe breeders wanting to duplicate champion bulls and cows will show enough interest so the business can get off the ground.
— AP
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