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Another social
security scheme Sensex zooms up
by 222 pts Now, recharge
Airtel cards for Rs 50
Govt okays 19
industrial clusters Tata Tele
Services to invest 1,000 cr |
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Haryana tax hike
hits Reliance Diesel fumes can
cause cancer, CSE tells govt GAIL files
prospectus
Ranbaxy Q4 net down 52 pc
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Another social security scheme New Delhi, January 23 The scheme, cleared by the Cabinet earlier this month, will cover 10 lakh workers till March 31 and one crore labourers over the next five years as part of a pilot scheme. There are around 27 crore workers in the unorganised sector in the country. The scheme will cost Re 1 a labour a day, Labour Minister Sahib Singh Verma told mediapersons after launching the scheme, which would be reviewed after two years. It provides triple benefits for unorganised workers — a pension of Rs 500 per month on attaining 60 years of age and family pension in case of death of a worker, a personal accident insurance cover for Rs 1lakh and a universal health insurance scheme for a worker and his family at the cost of Rs 548 per annum for a family for five years. The scheme will cover all workers in the age group of 18-35 years in the organised sector drawing wages of not more than Rs 6,500 per month. The scheme will be financed from workers, employers and the government at the rates of Rs 50 per month, Rs 100 per month and 1.16 per cent of the monthly wages of the workers, respectively. The scheme also provides an option for the workers in the age group of 36-50 years. The contribution for this category will be Rs 100 from a worker and an employee each. Self-employed workers may also join the scheme by contributing Rs 200 a month. It is voluntary for workers where there is no identifiable employer and for the self-employed. However, it is mandatory in case of registered and unregistered establishments where business or economic activity is carried out with the deployment of workers. Workers would be issued identity cards and social security numbers. Over 70 of them were issued cards today by Dr Verma. The Centre Board of Workers Education under the Labour Ministry will launch an awareness campaign about the scheme. The board has a Rs 6-crore fund, Dr Verma said. He denied that the Finance Ministry had raised objections to the scheme, saying that the scheme was being launched after the approval from the ministry. He added that there were no plans to impose cess on diesel and petrol in near future to fund the scheme. The coverage, compliance, registration, record keeping and the benefit delivery of the scheme will be handled by the Employees Provident Fund Organisation.
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Sensex zooms up by 222 pts
Mumbai, January 23 The premier indices recovered on sustained heavy buying in all round scrips by FIIs and some domestic institutional investors in view of the excellent corporate third quarter results, brokers here said. The bulls were back in full force today and concentrated on buying in Infosys, Reliance, SBI, and HLL scrips. The Sensex gained by almost 4 per cent while the Nifty also garnered nearly 4.5 per cent. The last such single-trading gain was posted by way back in April 2000. The BSE also saw a record turnover of Rs 1,900 crore on a single day today. At one point, the Sensex was up over 235 points at 5,832 levels during the intra-day session. Market breadth was once again very positive, but the volumes were low. There was some huge buying in Infosys (up by Rs 311 to 5,484.45), Reliance (high by Rs 26 to 559.20), SBI (up Rs 42 to 524.50), HLL (up Rs 5.9 by Rs 195.05), Ranbaxy ( up Rs 18.65 by Rs 1,029.95), Wipro (up Rs 88 by Rs 1,723.40) and ONGC (up Rs 52 to 782.90). Of the 159.4 million shares traded on the BSE, there were 150.63 million advancing shares, and only 8.42 million declining ones. Of the 1,830 issues traded, there were 1,378 gainers and only 416 losers, brokers added. Brokers further informed that Moody’s upgrade, and good results from Tisco, Tata Motors, and Maruti have clearly lifted the mood on the street. Also, there has been a spate of value buying, given that loads of stocks were hammered down to low valuations, even as economic and corporate fundamentals remained unchanged. The recent correction saw the Sensex fall by over 650 points from the top of 6,249.6 points. Noted broker Ajit Sanghvi, MD, Malini Share Securities Co told UNI here today, “The markets look healthy again. The move has been broadbased. The money on the sidelines is getting back into stocks. I wouldn't attribute it to any one factor. It’s just a function of the sell-off having run its course... also, on the first couple of days of fall, it fell on below average volumes. So, I wouldn't give that much importance to that aspect.” Mr Sanghvi feels that ‘possibly’ the worst is behind us. He also said that he is more comfortable with the market situation now, than he was a couple of weeks ago. Last weekend, he had said that a correction is overdue. He is now viewing the next week with a sense of cautious optimism, and is advising investors to focus on businesses that they understand. However, heavy buying was seen heavyweight scrips like Infosys, Reliance, SBI, and HLL. The eager sentiment in the market lifted the Sensex by almost 4 per cent. Meanwhile, the NSE Nifty was up 78 points at 1847 points, up 4.35 per cent, brokers
added. — UNI
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Now, recharge Airtel cards for Rs 50 New Delhi, January 23 Previously, the entry level recharge coupon started from a
denomination of Rs 300. While Rs 50 recharge coupon would offer the customer Rs 25 worth or 10 minutes of airtime free, Rs 100 coupon would provide Rs 50 or 20 minutes of talk time and Rs 200 coupon would offer Rs 115 or 50 minutes of talk time. The validity of the three coupons would be 3 days, seven days and 14 days, respectively. The company also announced a new handset packaged scheme, offering Motorola C 201 at the package cost of Rs 3,299 with Rs 1800 worth of airtime. Samsung R 220 is packaged at Rs 3,999 with an offer of Rs 2,000 airtime. This way the two handsets would cost customers net Rs 1,499 and Rs 1,999, respectively. The company also announced the launch of a ‘National Recharge Coupon’ of Rs 300, Rs 500 and Rs 810, offering customers the facility to recharge their coupons while roaming. Chandigarh:
Mr Vinod Sawhny, Chief Executive Officer and Director, Mobility, Bharti Mobile Ltd., here today at the launch of the Airtel market expansion campaign “Aisee Azadi Aur Kahan” told mediapersons that the entry cost of
recharge at Rs 50 was the lowest in the prepaid category. With the new Airtel “Easy Charge”, prepaid customers can top up their prepaid cards with any value suiting their budget. For added convenience, they would enjoy the advantage of “Anytime Recharge”. They can recharge their prepaid cards while roaming in any of the 15 Airtel networks across India. He said ,“Prepaid category has always been the real engine for the unprecedented growth of the Indian mobile market. Time has now come to further charge up this
segment. The onus is on the mobile operators to innovate and provide never before offers. In this regard, the innovations will open up new frontiers for the entire prepaid market in Punjab, Haryana and Himachal”.
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Govt okays 19 industrial clusters
New Delhi, January 23 The scheme is aimed at enhancing international competitiveness of the domestic industry by providing financial assistance for creation of quality infrastructure through partnership in selected functional clusters. The features of the scheme include providing common facilities such as transport, roads, water, power, gas/fuel supply, effluent treatment and solid waste disposal. It also supports product design, information technology and marketing infrastructure. There is a provision of Rs 675 crore in Tenth Plan for this scheme, which provides for Central assistance up to 75 per cent of the project cost subject to a ceiling of Rs. 50 crore per cluster. The remaining 25 per cent of the cost has to be met by the user-industry and other stakeholders. While 19 clusters would be taken up in the first phase, 30 clusters/locations will be taken up for development in the Tenth Plan period.
“The critical feature of this new initiative is that the scheme will be implemented through a Special Purpose Vehicles (SPV) at the individual cluster level,”
an official statement said here today. The final approval would be subject to detailed appraisal of project proposals by leading financial institutes nominated for this
purpose. The APEX Committee has approved IL&FS, SBI Caps, IDBI and ICICI for appraisal of project proposals. The 19 industrial clusters chosen for development include one for the automobiles and parts in Vijaywada, gems and jewellery in Surat, chemical cluster, Vapi, auto component cluster, steel and metallurgy cluster at Jaipur, textile clusters in Ludhiana and Tirpur, stone cluster at Kishangarh in Rajasthan and pharmaceutical cluster in Hyderabad.
— UNI
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Tata Tele Services to invest 1,000 cr Chandigarh, January 23 In an interview with TNS, Mr Ajay Pandey, President, Tata Teleservices Ltd, disclosed that Tata Teleservices will soon enter the north Indian market in a big way. He said the company had already set up its office in Chandigarh, and was preparing plans for the launch of its services. “We are just waiting for the licences from the Centre government to start our work in the field,” he said. He claimed, “We will invest around Rs 1,000 crore in the next one year to launch our mobile and internet services in Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh and Himachal Pradesh. Once the licences are granted, we will launch our services in the next eight months.” At present, Tata Teleservices is operating under the brand name of Tata Indicom in six telecom circles, including Andhra Pradesh,
Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Delhi and Gujarat with a customer base of over 1.4 million. The company had recently filed letter for intent for 11 new telecom circles including UP East, UP West, Rajasthan, West Bengal, Kolkata, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh. Mr Pandey said, “As part of our efforts to set up all India operations, we will soon have our services across 17 telecom circles, covering the whole country excluding Jammu and Kashmir and North Eastern states.” He added that on the high speed CDMA 1XRTT network, the Tata will offer national roaming mobile service, fixed line wireless phones, internet, Vset, National Long Distance Services, ILD and metropolitan access services. About the impact of late entry of company in the region, he claimed that despite high tele-density and presence of number of players, the Punjab market had tremendous potential.
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Haryana tax hike hits Reliance Chandigarh, January 23 According to sources, the refinery owned by the Reliance group in Gujarat, which has been exempted from tax by that state, has been selling certain petroleum products like aviation turbine fuel, petrol, naphtha and diesel to bulk consumers in Haryana without tax. This had adversely affected the tax collection on these petroleum products in the state. The sources say this had also created an uneven field for other petroleum companies like Indian Oil, Bharat Petroleum and Hindustan Petroleum. In the past several months, the sale of these companies to the bulk consumers in the state had virtually come to nil. The state exchequer too was a looser. The sources say there was also apprehension that certain bulk consumers were diverting their supplies to small consumers. To put a stop to these practices, the government decided to bring LADT on a par with the rate of sales tax as applicable on these products when sold in the state. It may be mentioned that LADT is levied on those commodities which a manufacturer brings from outside the state without paying tax on these in the state. Official sources told TNS that by bringing LADT on these commodities on a par with the state sales tax, not only the government would get additional tax, a level field would also be created for all oil companies. According to the revised rates, LADT on aviation turbine fuel and petrol would be 20 per cent and on diesel 12 per cent. Naptha, when used as fuel, would also attract LADT at the rate of 12 per cent. The other petroleum based fuels, except crude oil and natural gas, would be taxed at 10 per cent. LADT would be charged at a rate of 4 per cent on crude oil and at a rate of 2 per cent on the petroleum products other than mentioned above.
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Diesel fumes can cause cancer, CSE tells govt
New Delhi, January 23 In a new study which highlights the harmful effects of diesel fumes, CSE attacks the rising sales of diesel cars, also accusing the government of adopting policies which encourage it. “After surveying vehicle registrations done by the capitals State Transport Authority, the CSE has unearthed a shocking and deadly trend: increasing numbers of Delhi residents are buying diesel cars. “And these cars can kill. Recent disclosures about the cancer risk from diesel fumes are alarming.’’ It said there had been a shattering 106 per cent annual incremental increase in diesel passenger car registration in Delhi since 1998-99 as against 12 per cent for petrol cars. “The enticing gap in the prices of diesel and petrol is the lure: Delhi, with the highest per capita income among all the metros, has the lowest diesel prices. Government refuses to correct this distortion,’’ the report points out. It says that the share of diesel cars, which was a mere four per cent of the total new car registration in 1999, had climbed to 16 per cent in 2003. The bigger jeeps or SUVs, taken separately, had shown a growth rate of 18 per cent.
— UNI
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GAIL files prospectus
New Delhi, January 23 “We have filed the draft red herring prospectus for the public office today,” GAIL Chairman and Managing Director Proshanto Banerjee said here. Of the 84,565,160 equity shares being offered through the book building route, 5 per cent are being proposed to be reserved for the employees of the company while 25 per cent shares will be allotted to retail investors. About 45 per cent of the share on offer have been reserved for Qualified Institutional Buyers (QIBs) while the remaining will be for non-institutional buyers. The GAIL public issue will hit the market on February 23 and remain open for bidding in a price band, that will be decided a day before the issue opens, till March 1, he said.
— PTI
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Inflation surges to 6.21 pc Gold up Rupee shoots New shampoo Spice KPMG |
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