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Saturday,
November 23, 2002, Chandigarh, India  
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Daewoo Motors up for sale
LSE inks pact with Nasscom
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SBI NPAs at Rs 15,485 cr
Proposals aim at simplicity, says Kelkar
Spice to invest 100 cr in Punjab |
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CD on history of currency notes
Men, beware of laptop
France keen on better ties with India
Indica most economical
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Daewoo Motors up for sale New Delhi, November 22 A Debt Recovery Tribunal in Mumbai invited bids from prospective buyers for the ailing car company that entered India as an arm of erstwhile Korean auto giant Daewoo in the mid 1990s. The DRT, the court which decides the fate of companies which default in payment of debt to financial institutions and banks, has fixed December 18, 2002 as the last date for receipt of offers for sales of the automaker on “as is where is” and “as it what is” basis from interested public parties. Daewoo Motor spokesman declined to comment. The auction of the plant, ordered by the Mumbai DRT No III through a public notice, followed recovery recourse sought by the three FIs — the ICICI, IDBI and Exim Bank — for their total secured loans totalling about Rs 1,000 crore from the company, sources involved in the process said. Of this, the ICICI has the highest exposure of about Rs 500 crore while the IDBI and Exim Bank have lent about Rs 450 crore and Rs 100 crore. The ICICI had petitioned the DRT for appointment of a receiver to sell the plant either through a private deal or through public auction. Sources said the assets of Daewoo Motors would be auctioned off in parts if the DRT was unable to find a buyer for the whole assets. Daewoo had invested about Rs 4,500 crore to set up operations which include its manufacturing plant in Surajpur (Uttar Pradesh) having a capacity to produce about 1 lakh cars annually. The other assets include an engine and transmission plant, press and die casting shop, paint shop and a 40 MW captive power plant. The sources pegged the book value of troubled car maker at about Rs 3,000 crore and said the plant was in good shape. In case, the money recovered from sale of assets was more than the total debt of the three FIs, it would be then used to pay off unsecured loans of Daewoo’s parent company, they said. One of the biggest foreign automakers to set up a base in the country, Daewoo India’s initial good run in the domestic market was affected soon after its Korean parent went bankrupt in November 2000. This led to a decline in sales which has resulted in the present production stoppage in the plant. The company’s problems were further compounded when General Motors took about a 42 per cent stake in the bankrupt Daewoo Motor Co. along with some overseas subsidiaries but left out the Indian operations in a deal signed in April this year. Daewoo Corporation, the parent of Daewoo Motor Co., holds 91.6 per cent stake in Daewoo India with the remaining by FIs and public.
PTI |
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LSE inks pact with Nasscom New Delhi, November 22 So far as the listing of IT companies on the LSE is concerned, the bourse today entered into an agreement with Nasscom to promote the “London Advantage” among these corporates. At present, three Indian companies — SSI, Hexaware and HFCL — are listed on the LSE. The LSE has tech mark as its international technology market. The memorandum of understanding, signed by Ms Furse and Nasscom President Kiran Karnik here, commits the two entities to share research and market data, organise joint marketing events and seminars and work together to promote the LSE. Disclosing that 18 Indian companies are listed on the LSE, twice those on NYSE and Nasdaq combined, Ms Furse said her bourse is talking to 50 more companies to get them listed on the LSE. The companies are a mix of old and new economy corporates, she said but refused to divulge details. When asked whether the LSE would set up similar arrangement with other industry associations to market itself among old economy companies, she said there were no such plans in the immediate future but something could be explored in years to come. Ms Furse said Indian companies registered a turnover of Rs 35,000 crore last fiscal at the LSE, up 13 per cent over the corresponding period of the previous financial year. The exchange has India Desk, a pool of experts on the Indian companies. Besides, the bourse is the largest pool of resources for overseas companies. As much as $ 2.4 trillion were transacted in overseas shares for the first six months of this fiscal, which is three times of the NYSE.
UNI |
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SBI NPAs at Rs 15,485 cr New Delhi, November 22 The total NPAs of the nationalised banks amounted to a whopping Rs 56,506.7 crore of which the NPAs of the non-priority sector alone constituted Rs 30,251.15 crore, he said during Question Hour. The NPAs of development financial institutions comprising the IDBI, SIDBI, the IFCI and the IIBI stood at Rs 21.324 crore as on March 31, 2002, he said. Banks have been advised to use the forum of the Lok Adalat for compromise settlements, Jaswant Singh said, adding that RBI in July, 2000. SBI cuts rates SBI said on Thursday that it has lowered the interest rate it pays on deposits by 25 to 50 points for various maturities. The bank had lowered rates on October 30, a day after the bank rate cut. The new rates will be effective from November 25. Deposits maturing between two years and less than three years will be 6.25 per cent, and the rate on deposits maturing in three years or more will be 6.50 per cent.
Reuters |
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Proposals aim at simplicity, says Kelkar New Delhi, November 22 Advocating the removal of unequal treatment in the system he said to promote growth and employment, it was important to have a fiscal system which provided equal incentives to all and the proposals of the Kelkar Committee Report will promote simplicity and transparency. |
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Spice to invest 100 cr in Punjab Chandigarh, November 22 The company has plans to invest a further Rs. 100 crore towards increasing its network infrastructure in 100 new sites, upgradation of its existing switch to the latest version available worldwide (SR 9.1). Also in a recent customer satisfaction survey conducted by Voice & Data, Spice Telecom has been rated as the best in India in terms of network coverage & ease of accessing the network, according to Mr. Ashok Goyal, Executive Director, Spice Telecom. This testimony by an independent agency comes close on the heels of a recent survey conducted by NFO MBL, where Spice Telecom was declared the best operator in North India. In yet another survey conducted by the CRIS, Spice is at the numero uno position among the top 10 operators in India with a 90 per cent growth rate in the subscriber base (Sept 2001 – Sept 2002). Mr Goyal told mediapersons here today that 100 new sites would be added in the coming months to improve coverage across the length and breadth of Punjab. Spice Telecom would also close to 300 Base Transmission Receivers in place by the end of December, 2002. In addition, to improve in-building coverage, this will also increase coverage in the remote areas of Punjab. As a result of these coverage initiatives, the network capacity would increase by 100 per cent. The upgradation of the switch will result in increasing the switch capacity to 8,00,000 subscribers. Spice Telecom has also implemented Synthesised Frequency Hopping on its network. This initiative will result in the improvement in the voice quality in the high traffic areas. Another initiative undertaken recently by Spice Telecom has been the introduction of Pan India incoming as well as outgoing national roaming on its pre-paid card. |
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CD on history of currency notes SAS Nagar, November 22 This CD has been designed for being played at the RBI Museum in Mumbai. It has been prepared in an interactive mode recreating the origin of the earliest currency notes in India starting from the pre-banking era to the banking era and paper currency notes which the RBI has launched for India and other countries. ‘‘The project was to convert the history of paper currency notes in India from 17th century A.D. till date into a linear presentation. Although most of the information was provided by the bank itself, it was quite a task to compile chronologically all that had happened and put it across in a readable, interesting form along with the visuals for the target audience’’, says Anumati, the designer of the CD. Although the CD starts with a colourful journey of the earliest forms of paper currency used in ancient and medieval India called ‘hundis’, the focus of the project remains the history of paper currency as we know it in India today. Today’s paper currency traces its origins to the late 18th century when private banks first issued notes, that circulated as money. The Bank of Hindoostan, The General Bank of Bengal & Behar were amongst the early known issuers of notes. Towards the mid 19th Century, to improve the security features, the Bank of Bengal changed the design of its notes and introduced micro prints and multi-coloured printing. Note denominations started from Rs 10 and went up to Rs 10,000. The CD also relates how the RBI continued to issue special currency for Burma from its office in Rangoon even after it seceded from India in 1938. After Independence India continued to use the existing notes and the RBI issued notes with the overprint for the Government of Pakistan and Hukumat-e-Pakistan on behalf of Pakistan till 1948. The symbol of Lion Capital at Sarnath was chosen as a symbol of independent India to replace the King George’s portrait on Indian notes. The RBI issued notes in a distinct color scheme for circulation in the Gulf region in 1959. These notes were not a legal tender in India. As these countries gradually introduced their own currency, they ceased to use Indian notes. |
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Men, beware of laptop
Paris, November 22 The unnamed 50-year-old father of two had balanced the computer on his lap while he wrote the report at home, taking about an hour to do it, according to a letter published in tomorrow’s issue of the British medical weekly, The Lancet. The following day, he started to develop painful blisters on his foreskin and scrotum, which became infected but eventually cleared up without the need for antibiotics. Laptop manuals usually advise users not to use the computer while its base is resting directly on exposed skin, as heat can build up if the device is left on for a long time. In this case, however, the patient had been wearing trousers and underpants. The tale “should be taken as a serious warning against the use of a laptop computer, in a literal sense,” said the letter’s author, Claes-Goran Ostenson of the Department of Molecular Medicine at Stockholm’s Karolinska Institute.
AFP |
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France keen on better ties with India New Delhi, November 22 Speaking at an interactive meeting organised by Ficci here, he said the idea of organising the French Season was an increased interaction between the corporate sector in the two countries thereby improving trade ties. |
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L&T takeover Aviva Life Sick units Bill centres Kisan card Marico skincare RadioBuzz Japan visit Nalco selfoff |
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