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Saturday,
April 19, 2003, Chandigarh, India  
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Jammu
industrialists to fight discrimination Textile
package for Jammu & Kashmir Peerless
aims 30 pc growth Cut
customs duty on HR coils: Chamber |
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India
has ‘edge’ over other WTO members BoP,
AirTel in pact for recharge facility Nokia
net rises 13 pc Profit
must have a purpose Bacchus
lovers profit from price war
PepsiCo
profit up 13 pc
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Jammu industrialists to fight discrimination
Jammu, April 18 Addressing a press conference here last evening, Chairman of the Federation, a newly-formed organisation of industrial associations, Kuldeep Dogra said Mr Vajpayee had expressed his desire to meet industrialists of Jammu and Kashmir and alleged that instead of providing opportunity to the genuine representatives of industrialists to highlight their view points, the authorities have called some blue-eyed traders on their behalf. Highlighting problems of the industries, Mr Dogra said “the industry in Jammu and Kashmir has been struggling for its survival right from inception due to locational disadvantages with increase cost of production by 8 to 10 per cent as compared to the neighbouring States”. “An effort has always been made by various state government to off this disadvantage by providing incentives”, he said but regretted that majority of these incentives offered from time to time only remained on paper due to vested interests of the implementing agencies which have become ‘dens of corruption”. Giving reasons for constituting Federation of Jammu Industries, Mr Dogra said that all industrial associations from Jammu have joined together and constituted the body to fight discrimination against the industrial sector of Jammu and to expose the vested interests of the bureaucrats of the Central and the state government. Mr Dogra said that another reason for forming the Federation was to replace “Yes men and traders” from the industry related corporations. Other office bearers of the Federation included Mr Anil Suri, Rattan Dogra and Ramesh Badyal as co-chairman and Narinder Jain and Rakesh Bhat as convenors. The Federation appealed to the Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee to implement the recently declared Central package and fulfill the then Prime Minister promises made on the floor of the both houses of Parliament to give debt relief for the revival of sick industry in the state. Mr Dogra also demanded 10 per cent tax holiday for the ten years, he extended to Jammu and Kashmir on the lines of Himachal Pradesh and Uttaranchal. Stressing on the need of formulating industrial policy, Mr Dogra appealed to Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed to take representatives of industry into confidence before issuing the new industrial policy. The Central transport subsidy, although applicable to the entire state yet the industry in Jammu is being denied this incentive for the reasons best known to the Industries Department, he said and demanded that the state Labour Policy should be
declared as the Labour Department has become an impediment in development of the industrial culture.
UNI
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Textile package for Jammu & Kashmir
New Delhi, April 18 The package covers three broad segments — integrated development plan for export promotion of carpet, promotion of handicrafts other than carpets and strengthening of infrastructure support. Addressing the All-India Handicrafts Board here today, Textile Minister Kashiram Rana said that during 2002-03, Rs 93.51 lakh was sanctioned for the J & K State Handicrafts Corporation and J & K Apex Federation for taking various components of the action plan. Mr Rana said the handicrafts exports of Rs 10,933.67 crore are poised to double in four to five years. The Tenth-Plan outlay for the handicraft sector has been fixed at Rs 425 crore, he said.
UNI
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Peerless aims 30 pc growth New Delhi, April 18 The company is aiming at much higher growth in the current fiscal from its operations in Punjab, Haryana, Delhi, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh as it has found the market to be responding positively to its schemes. It has already set up over 30 of its outlets in the region. Peerless, the Kolkata based largest residuary non-banking company of the country has achieved a high growth of 42 per cent in its national operations by recording a collection of Rs 925 crore in 2002-03 and for the current fiscal, the company has set a target of Rs 1100 crore-a growth of 19 per cent. The company has made big inroads in its business operations in UP and Uttaranchal and the figures show that the area contributed the maximum to the growth of business in the northern region. Similarly Punjab and Delhi recorded high growth of business in the last two years. The northern region office sources here point out that in the current fiscal, a total of about 7.5 lakh persons will be paid maturity dues involving an amount of Rs 315 crore and this will be undertaken through the holding of maturity payment melas, among others. In fact, Peerless is planning a massive marketing thrust in the northern region based on its results in 2002-03 and it has already identified Chandigarh, Ludhiana, Jalandhar, Patiala and Hoshiarpur as its thrust zones in Punjab. The company is focusing on development of new products and adding value to the existing products in the northern region.
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Cut customs duty on HR coils: Chamber
New Delhi, April 18 In its post-budget memorandum to the Centre, the Chamber said the gap between demand and indigenous availability of HR coils is around one million tonnes and this is likely to widen further in 2003-04. Adequate availability of HR coils at reasonable prices is essential for industrial growth, said the Chamber. Pointing out the recent hike in prices by domestic producers, PHDCCI said that market for finished products has not been able to absorb the hike thereby leading to financial and production related losses.
TNS
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India has ‘edge’ over other WTO members
New Delhi, April 18 Mr Menon said India had a greater comparative advantage over other WTO member countries due to its large pool of well- qualified IT professionals, engineers, architects, accountants and professionals in other fields. “Services would dominate the economic activities of countries at every stage of development, making liberalisation in the services trade a necessity”, he said.
TNS
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BoP, AirTel in pact for recharge facility Chandigarh, April 18 AirTel Magic customers of Punjab who are also Bank of Punjab customers, now have the option of recharging their cards at more than 131 ATM centers of the bank across the country. All that a customer needs to do is to insert the ATM card, punch the PIN number and follow simple instructions as displayed on the ATM screen. Customers can choose the recharge denomination and punch the 16-digit recharge number as seen on the screen on their mobile to avail of the service. Mr C.R. Sharma, Managing Director, Bank of Punjab, said, “It has been our endeavour to bring the true value of anytime banking to our customers and this initiative is in line with our objective. We are proud of the fact that Bank of Punjab and AirTel have come together to offer this facility and are sure that our common customers will find it very useful”. Launching these services, Mr Vinod
Sawhny, CEO, Bharti Mobile Ltd. Northern Region, said, “Living upto our promise of consistently delivering best value for money and continuously enhancing value proposition, we are launching these services for our customers in Punjab. In Haryana also these services will be extended shortly.
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Nokia net rises 13 pc
HELSINKI (Finland) April 18 For the three months ended March 31, the company said it earned $ 1 billion on sales of $ 7.3 billion. That compares with a profit of 863 million euros on revenue of 7 billion euros a year earlier. The drop in overall sales revenue was blamed largely on its ailing network equipment division.
AP
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Profit must have a purpose The sight of British and American companies squabbling over pickings from the not-quite-dead corpse of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq will confirm the widely held view that the business world will stop at nothing to pursue profit. It is not just in the Middle East that there is a suspicion that the rationale for this war was to protect the interests of corporate America, with a few crumbs for its British friends. This will inevitably increase the volume of calls for more corporate responsibility and accountability. This debate already has momentum (see www.openDemocracy.net). An increasingly affluent, educated and informed public has rising expectations of everything — including corporate behaviour — as demonstrated by the growth in socially responsible investment. But if the momentum of the debate is growing, the same cannot be said for the mutual comprehension of the protagonists. At one pole are the non-governmental organisations. They see no alternative to global legislation to compel companies to behave responsibly. At the other are the free-market ideologues who believe the public interest is simply the sum of all private interests. Public intervention is an unwarranted interference in the sacred duty of a corporate management to its shareholders. The passion with which these views are held adds nothing to their clarity. The business world must understand that it should explain more and assume less about its contribution to society. In the twenty-first century, the minimum social case is that what business does is legal, profitable and socially and environmentally responsible. Since business cannot decide for itself what is responsible, it must engage with a wide range of partners in order for this to be done. Limited liability is a privilege granted to corporate beings by society without which it is hard to imagine how they could play a beneficial role in our lives. But the terms of that privilege are re-negotiable as circumstances change. Most people have learnt that companies that provide jobs today can take them away tomorrow. A company’s contribution to the economy as a whole is necessary, but it is no longer a sufficient reason for granting it a licence to operate. The non-governmental community says corporations must be accountable, but not to whom and for what. Corporations are already formally accountable to shareholders, employees, customers and regulators. Those calling for greater corporate responsibility need to be clearer about where those boundaries are and what part they play in defining them. They must recognise there is no such entity as the corporate sector. Portfolio investors have different responsibilities from those who invest in creating real assets and both are different from traders. There will be no single test of responsible corporate behaviour. Business and non-governmental organisations both require social and political stability. At a time when events threaten to undermine that stability, the public has much to gain from the debate about corporate responsibility, but only if the protagonists can adopt language more reasoned than that which brought us to war in Iraq.
The Guardian The writer is a Visiting Professor at Imperial College London and works for Rio
Tinto.
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Bacchus lovers profit from price war Samana, April 18 The rivalry among contractors of Punjab and Haryana has resulted in a virtual bonanza for the peasantry as well as residents of the town. A syndicate in Haryana, which controls trade in six districts of the state, is offering liquor at its Azeemgarh vend in Kaithal district, which is on the border of this town, at very low rates. This has resulted in people flocking to the vend, beside which a bar has also sprung up. The price reduction, which started on April 15, has resulted in Punjab contractors asking for the help of the state Excise Department. Accordingly, excise staff has been posted on the Punjab side of the border to ensure that bottles are not carried into the state. The excise staff destroy the bottles which people try to carry into Punjab. The Punjab contractors have also reduced the price of countrymade liquor at the two vends close to the Haryana border in the town. However, the latter have not lowered the prices of IMFL. A visit to the spot revealed that countrymade liquor was being sold for Rs 40 per bottle at the Azeemgarh vend in Haryana as well as two Punjab vends in the town. The rates of IMFL at Azeemgarh for brands like Aristocrat, Green Label and 8 p.m. are Rs 60 per bottle from the earlier rate of Rs 150, that for Peter Scot and Royal Challenge is Rs 200 per bottle from the earlier rate of Rs 400 per bottle. For low brand scotch, it is Rs 400 per bottle from the earlier rate of Rs 1,200. Beer is being sold for Rs 30, compared to the earlier rate of Rs 60 per bottle. The price war initiated by the Haryana syndicate has resulted in tension between contractors and the excise staff. Excise officers from Haryana, including Excise and Taxation Officer Bhim Singh Gill and Inspector Jagdish Dhiwan, were present in the office of the Punjab syndicate when The Tribune team visited it. The officers had come in their official vehicle but when questioned about the distress selling of liquor, they said they were not aware of it. The Punjab contractor present said the officers had come to meet him because he had met with an accident recently. Meanwhile, Punjab contractors are feeling the pinch of the price war as the Haryana syndicate has decided to lower the prices when hundreds of farmers have descended on the grain market in the town to sell their wheat produce. As many of them have to stay for the night, liquor sales have shot up. Even though Punjab excise officials are posted on the border, they have not registered any case in the past two days because the farmers are an organised lot and could protest against any such move. A price war had also erupted last year between contractors of Punjab and Haryana in this town. Punjab contractors are at a disadvantage because they have to pay an additional 22 per cent sales tax on IMFL while their Haryana counterparts are exempt from this. Haryana contractors also have the facility of getting liquor in excess of their quota. Enterprising persons have even started smuggling the liquor to other parts of the state due to the limited presence of the excise staff in the town.
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