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Tuesday, April 16, 2002, Chandigarh,
India  
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CORPORATE NEWS
Look beyond small gains, says PM
Car, bike sales rise; scooter dips
Expedite inspection of RPL accounts: HC |
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HDFC Bank posts 41 pc growth in net
Pay AirTel bills via IDBI Bank
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CORPORATE NEWS Mumbai, April 15 "Sales for this quarter have been down due to continued sluggishness and degrowth in the global as well as domestic FMCG market and exports. We have discontinued non-value added traded exports and enhanced the profitability in the foods segment at cost of short term volume," HLL Director Finance D Sundaram said here today. The domestic business recorded a decline of 5.4 per cent while exports dipped by 30.7 per cent due to discontinuation of non-value adding trading exports, he added. "We want to position ourselves as export source for Unilever especially in the Western countries," Sundaram said. He said the multinational had discontinued some of its non-value adding exports businesses, including marine products thus contributing to a sharp decline in export sales. Yet, Sundaram said the multinational would benefit from the reported growth in agriculture. "With prospects being brighter in agricultural segments this year, may be HLL will perform better in this quarter or even take it further to the June quarter+, Sundaram said adding the MNC had rationalised some of its food product categories like atta, salt and tea. The results were not fully comparable to the previous year on account of certain acquisitions and disposals during last four quarters, he said. HLL incurred a business restructuring cost in the Q1 at Rs 2.74 crore as against Rs 6.25 crore. This year the cost for same is estimated to be around Rs 25 crore. In declining market, the revenue in soaps and detergents reflected a decline in 4.3 per cent with personal category wash sales down by 6.1 per cent while that of fabric wash were down by 5.2 per cent. In personal products, the skin sales registered a growth of 6.6 per cent, but overall sales in this segment declined due to lower sales in other categories as well as the one time effect of stock rebating consequent on the excise duty reduction.
PTI Zuari Ind to invest 103 cr Zuari Industries (ZIL) will provide a Rs 103 crore assistance to Zuari Cement (ZCL), to help it tide over liquidity problems arising out of acquisition of Shri Vishnu Cement in January. ZCL is a joint venture with French company Ciments Francais. ZIL will convert Rs 53 crore subordinated debt representing losses incurred by the cement division into equity shares of Rs 10 each fully paid-up on a par and will also provide Rs 50 crore loan to ZCL, ZIL officials said. |
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Look beyond small gains, says PM New Delhi, April 15 Inaugurating the 51st Annual Conference of Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA), here, he said “excessive commercialism, especially when it takes place in the absence of effective regulatory mechanisms, can lead to negative consequences”. Stating that environmental degradation and erosion of traditional social values could make the growth of tourism unsustainable, he said India had examples of how some tourism centres suffered due to unplanned and unaesthetic growth. He pointed out that the travel and tourism industry, including the civil aviation industry, had been badly affected as a result of the September 11 terrorist attacks in the USA. “We in India, being victims of terrorism for close to two decades, know all too well how it has adversely affected tourism in Jammu and Kashmir and elsewhere”, The time has come for the entire tourism fraternity in the world to intensify its campaign against terrorism and extremism. “India is now all geared up to reach its true potential in tourism”, he told over 1,000 delegates from 40 countries who have gathered here for the conference which is being held in the country after a gap of 24 years. India was investing large sums for expanding and modernising its infrastructure in airports and airlines, railways, national highways, hotels and transport, development of tourism circuits, preservation and maintenance of monuments and other things related to tourism. Recalling his recent visit to Singapore and Cambodia, Mr Vajpayee said though Singapore has a thriving tourism industry, Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong told him that he would like India and Singapore to design joint tourism package.
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Car, bike sales rise; scooter dips
New Delhi, April 15 Sales of market leader Maruti, Ford and Hindustan Motors fell while Hyundai Motor recorded flat growth during the review month. Total car sales rose, for the sixth successive month, to 65,147 units for 62,886 units in March 2001, data released by the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) showed today. Sales during the financial year 2001-02 was almost flat at 5.70 lakh cars against 5.67 lakh units in the year-ago period, the data showed. Commercial vehicle sales, a good indicator of economic growth, went down by 2.4 per cent to 18,642 units (19,108 units in the year-ago month). Multi-utility-vehicles (MUVs) also performed poorly dropping by 13.9 per cent at 13,023 units (15,130 units). In the two-wheeler segment, motor cycles continued with its upswing clocking a 37.8 per cent growth at 2.90 lakh units (2.10 lakh units). However, sales of scooters, once the mainstay of the Indian middle class, fell by 17.7 per cent at 63,936 units in March 2002 (77,697 units). Sale of mopeds were also lower by 19.6 per cent at 38,919 units (48,442 units) while that of three-wheelers jumped by an impressive 54.8 per cent to 19,096 vehicles (12,335 units). Maruti Udyog’s car sales fell by 6.8 per cent in March 2002 to 34,727 units (37,265 units in the year-ago month). The Indian subsidiary of South Korea’s Hyundai Motor Co posted a flat growth selling 9,513 cars (9,509 units) while its troubled native rival, Daewoo Motors did not divulge its sales figures for the review month. Driving on rising sales of its premium small car ‘Palio’, Fiat India recorded a massive 535.3 per cent growth selling 4,003 cars (630 units). Sales of Tata Engineering, maker of the ‘Indica’, surged ahead by 65.9 per cent at 8,769 cars (5,284 units) while that of Honda Siel cars grew by 24.4 per cent at 1,582 units (1,271 units). But, Hindustan Motors recorded a 11.2 per cent decline at 2,532 cars (2,853 units). The Indian arm of US-based Ford Motor Co. witnessed a 5.8 per cent drop at 2,501 cars (2,655 cars) but General Motors clocked a 30.2 per cent rise at 1,360 cars (1,044 units). Luxury car maker Daimler Chrysler’s March 2002 sales were 81.8 per cent more over the year-ago month at 160 units. In the MUV segment, sales of market leader Mahindra and Mahindra (M&M) was almost flat at 5,706 MUVs (5,762 units) while that of Toyota Kirloskar fell by 37 per cent at 1,894 vehicles (3,010 units). Tata Engineering and Maruti also witnessed a 7.4 and 53.4 per cent decline at 3,339 and 834 units, respectively. In the scooter segment, Bajaj Auto’s sales fell by 32.8 per cent to 25,298 scooters (37,682 units), that of LML dipped 51.5 per cent to 5,642 units (11,647 units). Kinetic Motor Co. and TVS Motor Co. also recorded a 25.2 and 7.9 per cent drop at 8,407 and 8,589 units, respectively. In the motor cycle segment, market leader Hero Honda’s sales jumped by 40.4 per cent at 1.34 lakh motor cycles (95,630 units) while Bajaj that of Bajaj Auto’s went up 35.4 per cent at 72,043 units (53,206 units). Sales of TVS Motor and Yamaha were also up by 68.6 and 2.1 per cent at 54,058 and 21,130 motor cycles respectively. New entrant Kinetic Engineering sold 4,029 motor cycles while LML’s sales fell by 62.8 per cent to 2,608
units. PTI
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Expedite inspection of RPL accounts: HC
New Delhi, April 15 A Bench comprising Mr Justice Devinder Gupta and Mr Justice S. Mukherjee directed the DCA’s Regional Director (west), Mumbai, to carry out limited inspection expeditiously and file the report by May 24. “The status report has to be filed with the signature of Secretary, DCA,” the Bench said and fixed May 29 as the next date for hearing. The court’s direction came following government’s failure to complete the inspection of company’s record by March 31 on a PIL petition by Janata Party President Subramanian Swamy alleging that UTI, LIC and GIC funds meant for RPL’s refinery project were placed by it for investment in group companies in violation of law some years ago. The government counsel informed the court that till now preliminary inspection had been completed with regard to two companies while the inspection was in progress with regard to another two and for remaining two it was yet to be started. The Ministry of Law had given sanction to DCA’s Regional Director (west) to verify whether the group companies —Reliance Industries, Lavanya Holdings and Trading and Reliance Industries Infrastructure — had the technical know-how and professional expertise to execute the refinery project in Gujarat. PTI Merger approved
Shareholders of Reliance Petroleum Ltd (RPL) today approved the merger of RPL with Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) at the shareholders’ meeting convened under the orders of the Gujarat High Court. The resolution was passed with an overwhelming majority and was supported by all categories of shareholders, including international and domestic institutional investors, and retail investors, the company said in a release here.
UNI
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HDFC Bank posts 41 pc growth in net
Mumbai, April 15 The bank’s Board has recommended a 25 per cent dividend for the reporting year as against 20 per cent last year, the bank said in a release here today. Total income rose by 40.91 per cent to Rs 2,036.24 crore as against Rs 1,444.99 crore in the previous year. For the fourth quarter ended March 31, the bank’s net profit stood higher by 37.69 per cent at Rs 90.24 crore over Rs 65.54 crore in the Q4 ended March 31, 2001. The total income in the period under review was Rs 566.02 crore as compared to Rs 419.88 crore in Q4 last year, the bank added. Bank deposits increased by 51 per cent from Rs 11,658 crore to Rs.17,654 crore. Savings account deposits increased by 55 per cent from Rs 1,903 crores to Rs 2,957 crores. Total advances grew by 47 per cent to Rs 6,814 crore, said. The capital adequacy ratio stood at 13.9 per cent against the regulatory requirement of 9 per cent. The total retail loans portfolio as of March 31 was Rs 1,531 crore, a growth of 81 per cent over Rs 845 crore in the previous year. The bank’s net non-performing assets (NPAs) stood at 0.5 per cent of advances and 0.3 per cent of total customer assets.
PTI
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Indiatimes DMD Reminiscent TV Spice MD Himani offer Tanishq Diva Bajaj workshop IOB cuts rates Max India Marriott hotels ONGC, BHEL pact Jindal Vijaynagar |
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