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ONGC faces action if it picks Yukos stake
Reliance pays Rs 84.7 cr to BSNL
Sensex continues southwards
Exports cross $ 53 b
Cairn finds gas in Rajasthan
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Pact with Myanmar on energy inked
Tata motor and finance arms merged
Minister tells paper industry to get eco-friendly
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ONGC faces action if it picks Yukos stake
Moscow, January 11 “One thing they are doing is guaranteeing that they will be a party to our law suits,” Yukos spokesman Mike Lake told ‘The Moscow Times’, commenting on reports of ONGC’s plans to pick up to 15 per cent stake in Yuganskneftegaz (yugansk). He said, “Any bid from ONGC would ensure that the Indian company faces the same legal action as other beneficiaries of the Yugansk sale.” “We have said over and over again that anyone who participates in the sale or future sale and purchase of Yukos assets will face legal action as we seek damages,” Lake said. “This is a high-stakes game of hide-and-seek, but we will find out what is behind the curtain and seek damages from those who have participated, facilitated and financed the sale or purchase of Yugansk,” he told the paper from Dallas. ONGC officials had earlier indicated that the company was eyeing 10-15 per cent stake in Yugansk. “ONGC has an agreement with Rosneft (which acquired Yugansk) and it may farm into one of the oil fields of Yugansk,” a senior company official said in New Delhi. Russia’s state-owned Rosneft held a Yugansk extraordinary shareholders’ meeting in Nefteyugansk on December 31, appointing Vladimir Bulba as the production unit’s new general director. Rosneft said it was paying wages and planning to accelerate drilling programmes to catch up with output plans. Yukos CEO Steven Theede called Rosneft’s takeover illegal in Russian law and a breach of US bankruptcy proceedings.
— PTI
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Reliance pays Rs 84.7 cr to BSNL
New Delhi, January 11 Reliance deposited the amount on January 7, thereby clearing the dues of Rs 182.7 crore it owed to BSNL till October 2004, BSNL officials said adding the total amount pending on Reliance was Rs 263 crore till date. The Supreme Court had on January 3 directed the private telecom operator to pay the balance amount within a week failing which BSNL would be free to disconnect the services. BSNL’s total demand of Rs 263 crore includes the unpaid ADC levy till date. Appearing for the Reliance group company, senior advocate Harish Salve had said the company calculated the default at only Rs 29 crore and as it has already paid Rs 98 crore, it be allowed to secure the outstanding amount of Rs 84.7 crore through bank guarantees. Reliance’s demand was turned down by the apex court and was asked to clear the dues within a week. Earlier, the Supreme Court had fixed January 31, 2005, as the outer limit for the high court to give its verdict on the petition filed by Reliance challenging the demand of Rs 182.7 crore made by BSNL. The case will come up for hearing in the high court on January 13.
— PTI
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Sensex continues southwards
Mumbai, January 11 The Sensex closed at 6,222, down 86 points. The NSE Nifty too closed lower at 1,952 down 30 points. All major heavyweights in metal, cement and pharma stocks were moving down despite the Finance Ministry’s announcement about the disinvestment process being revived. HLL closed 1 per cent lower while the Reliance group continued to be under pressure. While Reliance Industries and IPCL were down over a per cent each, Reliance Energy posted losses of over 2 per cent at the bourses. Reliance Capital, however, ended the day in the green. The scrip closed at Rs 136.60, up almost a per cent. Among cement stocks ACC,
Birla Corp and Gujarat Ambuja were lower by 3 per cent while Grasim Industries
was down 2 per cent. Pharma stocks too slipped further. Cipla was down 5 per cent while Dr Reddy’s Lab fell 3 per cent and Ranbaxy was down 4 per cent. Only Aventis gained 2 per cent. In metals Hindalco was down almost 4 per cent while Nalco was down over 3.5 per cent. Steel majors Sail and Tisco were down 4 per cent and 2 per cent, respectively. State-owned BPCL and HPCL lost too lost 2 per cent while GAIL ended the day with losses of over 2 per cent. Only IBP closed with marginal gains. Banking stocks were reeling. Andhra Bank was down 7 per cent while Corporation Bank was down 6 per cent. Bank of Punjab, Dena Bank, Indian Overseas Bank and Bank of Baroda and Bank of India shed over 5 per cent each. Bucking the trend, however, was the privately-owned ICICI Bank. The scrip closed with gains of 0.53 per cent.
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Exports cross $ 53 b
New Delhi, January 11 “The surge in India’s exports is continuing despite appreciation of the rupee and the double-digit growth of over 20 per cent is being sustained”, an official statement said. Meanwhile, Minister of Commerce and Industry Kamal Nath has announced an export target of $ 88 billion for the next financial year 2005-06. In pursuance of this, the Ministry of Commerce and Industry is interacting with the Export Promotion Councils and Commodity Boards concerned to finalise the targets sector-wise and commodity-wise for each of the next four years to enhance India’s exports to the level of $ 88 billion in 2005-06, $ 104 billion in 2006-07, $ 125 billion in 2007-08 and $ 150 billion in 2008-09. Strategies to unlock the potential of agricultural exports from India would also be worked out, the statement said. According to disaggregated data for April-August 2004-05, the sectors showing high growth in exports are gems & jewellery, engineering goods, ores & minerals excluding coal and mica, petroleum products, chemicals & related products, project goods, cereals except rice, plantations including tea, textiles, excluding jute manufactures, cashew, including cashew nut shell, oil meals, leather & manufactures, meat and preparations.
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Cairn finds gas in Rajasthan
New Delhi, January 11 “Cairn has made a new gas discovery with the Raageshwari-5 well, currently operating 75 km south of Mangala (oil field), in the southern part of Rajasthan basin,” a company statement said here. The company’s oil discoveries, Mangala and Aishwariya (formerly N-A field), are scheduled to bring oil production from the last quarter of 2007. Plateau rates are currently targeted at between 80,000 and 1,00,000 barrels per day. India currently imports 2 million barrels of oil a day. It produces 6,50,000 barrels a day itself, of which 50,000 comes from the Cairn-operated Ravva field. Cairn said an appraisal well would be required to determine the reservoir extent and size of the gas column before a volumetric assessment of the new Raageshwari discovery can be made. “The initial evaluation of this Raageshwari Fatehgarh gas discovery is encouraging but further evaluation and appraisal will be required before understanding its full significance,” company chief executive Bill Gammell said. Cairn has also secured a further exploration area, as an extension to its existing onshore acreage in Rajasthan. The company has received approval from the government to explore for oil and gas in a further 856 sq km extension of the block to the north west of the recent NV discovery. The extension runs until the middle of May 2005.
— PTI
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Pact with Myanmar on energy inked
New Delhi, January 11 India is making efforts to sign an agreement with Myanmar and Bangladesh for gas pipeline from Myanmar to India via Bangladesh. The MoU will commit both the countries to promote cooperation in the full range of energy-related activity covering the upstream and downstream sectors, marketing, training, and coordination in the development of energy related policies. The agreement was signed by Indian Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar, currently on a visit to Myanmar, and the Myanmar Energy Minister, Brig Gen Lun Thi. Mr Aiyar had a meeting with the Myanmar Prime Minister Lt Gen Soe Win. The Prime Minister
welcomed India’s participation in the development of the energy sector in Myanmar and urged an active Indian role in the development of the various petroleum and gas blocks on-shore, off-share and deep sea, that were on offer.
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Tata motor and finance arms merged
New Delhi, January 11 As per the scheme of amalgamation, shareholders of Tata Finance will get 8 equity shares of Tata Motors for every 100 equity shares held by them. The exchange ratio for the proposed merger is based upon a valuation conducted by Bansi Mehta and Company, the chartered accountants, which did the valuations for the deal, the Boards of Directors of the two companies said yesterday. The merger would be subject to the approval of the Bombay High Court and would be effective from April 1, 2005. Tata Motors said it expected the acquisition to help the vehicle financing business of Tata Finance grow stronger. This merger will also allow Tata Finance shareholders to participate in the growth of Tata Motors, a leading automobile company in the country, and thereby significantly gain with an upside of dividend and shareholder value creation. Furthermore, Tata Motors Board has also approved the merger of its two subsidiary companies Telco Dadajee Dhackjee Ltd and Suryodaya Capital and Finance (Bombay) Ltd with the company.
— UNI
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Minister tells paper industry to get eco-friendly
New Delhi, January 11 Minister of Environment and Forests A. Raja has urged the leaders of the Indian paper manufacturers to adopt safer alternatives for raw materials, lesser and benign chemicals like chlorine-free bleaching, and enzymatic
delignification. The sector is termed an environmentalist’s nightmare with huge usage of water and raw material like wood and bamboo and generation of huge amounts of wastewater into rivers. The industry is resource intensive, whether it is the usage of forest products, water or energy. Besides this, it is one of the highly polluting industries. The Government, it may be mentioned, has already promulgated environmental standards for water effluents, air emissions, and solid and hazardous wastes, as well as issued guidelines for safe handling of hazardous chemicals and wastes under the Environment Protection Act, 1986. The ministry now is also in the process of notifying new standards for absorbable organic halogens, which measures the amount of chlorinated organic compounds in pulp and paper effluent discharge, in the liquid effluent for both large and small-scale industry. The standards, Mr Raja said, had been evolved after a series of consultations with the industry and would be notified soon. It may be mentioned that environment vigilance is rising in the industry, but it still has a long way to go. While in 1999 only one company had an environmental policy of some sort, at present more than 16 companies are said to be having such a policy, perhaps a result of pressure from the society, including PILs against several companies. Adopting environmentally- friendly measures have brought down the average consumption of water, from 200 tonnes per tonne paper produced, to 135 tonnes. There has also been a reduction in the use of toxic substances like chlorine and sourcing of wood from farmers instead of depleting government farmlands The area brought under the farmland has also doubled. However the sector, when compared in terms of best global practices, still has a long way to go as ground realities show that a balance had to be maintained between procuring raw material from the social sector and independent sources of the mill. For that the industry has been demanding participation in forestry. The minister told the Indian paper manufacturers that well-established biotechnologies, including bio-bleaching, use of fungi and a mixture of enzymes, could be adopted for fulfilling environmental quality norms and global challenges.
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Telecom snippets
Chandigarh, January 11 Addressing mediapersons here today, DGM (Marketing), Mr Mukul Khanna, said the pack will enable subscribers save up to 83 per cent on the admin fee as only the team leader will be charged the fee on every recharge and not the other members. The pack is loaded with a single second pulse and subscribers can make local calls at 4 paise/sec and calls within the group will be charged at a nominal rate of 0.50 per minute. Mr Khanna said the service will particularly address the needs of the youth, large and small businesses, sales teams, and professionals. The subscriber has to buy a pack containing at least three mobile connections. With this, Spice is all set to meet the challenge posed by a similar service “Push to Talk” by Tata
Indicom.
Airtel
Airtel today announced the slashing of STD rates for pre-paid Airtel Haryana customers. STD calls made to any GSM Mobile in Delhi and Punjab will now be at just Rs 1.50 per minute, compared to the current tariff of Rs. 2 per minute for Airtel-to-Airtel calls and Rs. 3.25 to other GSM Mobiles.
Hutch sms
Hutch today announced for its post paid and pre-paid subscribers in Punjab the Scheduled Messaging Service. This service helps pre-set your text messages well in advance, so that you do not forget sending important messages, said Arun Kapoor, Chief Operating Officer, Punjab, Hutch. The service allows you to send sms-es to your loved ones on their birthdays, anniversaries or any special occasion without forgetting the date, or waking up at midnight. Business executives can direct important official information as per one’s convenience to multiple people.
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