The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

	Emerging powers like India should head IMF: MD Tribune News Service New Delhi, December 2 Appreciating India’s rising stature as an economic power, IMF managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn said on Thursday that the next heads of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) should be from emerging economies like India. “Let us be candid. The (era of ) so-called agreements between the US and Europeans, whereby the IMF head used to be European and the World Bank president American is over,” Strauss-Kahn told reporters after meeting Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee here. There have been reports that India was pushing for the appointment of Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia as the next MD of the IMF. “I think it will be just fair that the next leader of the two institutions will come from somewhere else in the world,” Strauss-Kahn added. He added that that the emergence of G20 has changed the rules of the game in international policy cooperation and emerging markets like India will increasingly play an important role in the G20. He stressed that reforms in the IMF to give more voice to emerging countries including India is making the IMF more legitimate. The IMF chief held wide-ranging discussions on global issues, the current situation in Europe, the risks to the global economy and India’s role in the IMF. Kahn expressed confidence in India’s handling of capital inflows and said as a fast growing balanced economy, focused on inclusive growth, India has been able to bring millions out of poverty. In his remarks, the finance minister said that India will play its due role in the G20 and support the process of policy cooperation in addressing external and development imbalances. He said the broader recovery of global economy is very crucial for the world at large including India. He specifically mentioned the role played by IMF in the package announced for Ireland. Mukherjee explained that inclusive growth will remain the bedrock of India’s growth strategy. He said that growth is expected to reach its pre-crisis levels of 9% next year. Apart from investing in infrastructure, India was engaged in an ambitious programme of skill development in order to harness its demographic dividend and ensure long-term sustainability of high growth.
	Godrej Properties to develop residential project at Mohali Chandigarh, December 2 Godrej Properties Ltd (GPL), a real estate arm of Godrej Group, today said it would develop a residential housing project at Mohali in Punjab, which could involve a capital outlay of Rs 450 crore. Besides, the company would also focus on several cities, including NCR, Mumbai, Bangalore, Pune, Chennai and Chandigarh for developing a slew of residential projects in line with its plans to cash in on the growing demand for housing from urban sector “We are looking to develop a residential project in Mohali with a minimum land of 20-25 acres...we are in talks with certain land owners here for (entering into a) joint venture in this project,” the company’s MD Milind Korde told reporters. Though investment is not a constraint for the company for the upcoming project at Mohali, yet the estimated capital outlay in this project may be around Rs 450 crore, including the land cost, he said. GPL is already in the process of developing its first Rs 400-crore commercial project in Chandigarh, which will be spread over 4.04 acres with a development size of 6.80 lakh sq ft. “This project is going to complete by September next year,” he said. The company’s focus towards growing real estate sector of northern region could also be gauged that it has set up a 3,500 sq ft office here, which will take care of its projects in northern region. GPL, having presence in 11 cities across country, is developing 83 million sq ft, which would be done in a span of next 8-10 years. — PTI
	Nokia installs server for e-mail interception New Delhi, December 2 Nokia today announced installation of a server in India to enable security agencies lawfully intercept its email and messenger services, a move which may force BlackBerry to follow suite. Nokia India VP and MD D Shivakumar called on Home Secretary G K Pillai today and handed over the letter, saying the company has conformed with all requirements suggested by the law enforcement agencies. The company, however, assured its customers that their privacy would be protected, even while fulfilling public responsibility and legal obligations. “As a responsible corporate citizen, we follow all local laws and regulations that are required by the government authorities," it added. Installing a server to intercept data sent and received through smart-phones was a key demand of security agencies, which feared that this service could be used terror elements. "We made a commitment to install host servers in India by end of the year. It gives me immense pleasure to inform you that it has been installed. We have completed the software installation and internal testing and the messaging service is now live on our India based servers," Shivakumar said in the letter. This comes amid concerns raised by the government over flow of data on smart phones, especially BlackBerry which offers services like BlackBerry-to-BlackBerry messaging and enterprise mail on the device. Canada-based Research-in-Motion, makers of BlackBerry, had said it was an industry issue and should be dealt with all the players including Nokia and other service providers who offer Virtual Private Network (VPN) services. RIM has been saying that the security architecture was the same around the world and RIM truly had no ability to provide the agencies its customers' encryption keys. The government has given Blackberry time till January 2011 to create lawful interception facilities with all operators offering the service. With Nokia installing the servers in India, "the tool provides real time intercept of content. It also facilitates location of the mobile device generating emails," Shivakumar's letter to Pillai said. According to the company, Nokia Messaging is a push mail service that aggregates current email accounts of the subscribers on their mobile phones. The service merely collates information available through the internet and directs it to the respective mobile devices.
	Mobile connections cross 687 million: TRAI Girja Shankar Kaura Tribune News Service New Delhi, December 2 After the automobile sector, it was the telecom sectors turn today to reflect the growing purchasing power of the Indians, which has been improving with the growth of the economy. The officials figures released by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) said there was an over 2.5 per cent increase in the number of mobile users in the country by the end of September. The number of mobile connections in the country reached 687.71 mn as on September 30, with the addition of 17.10 mn subscribers. According to the TRAI, the wireless phone user base grew 2.55 per cent to 687.71 mn in September, from 670.60 mn in the previous month. With this, the total telephone subscriber base in the country, both wireless and wireline connections combined, touched 723.28 mn. The total telephone density reached 60.99 per cent. Surprisingly, the growth in wireless phone category in the month was led by state-owned Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited with 13.36 per cent of the net additions in September, taking its user base to 78.3 mn users. The other telecom service providers who did better than the country’s largest telecom operator Bharti Airtel were Uninor and Tata Teleservices each of which added 2.2 mn users taking their total subscriber base to 11.2 mn and 79 mn respectively. Bharti Airtel and Reliance Communications added two mn users each, taking the total subscriber base to 143.3 mn and 117.3 mn respectively. Incidentally, Bharti was fourth in the line for additions with 11.93 per cent increase in its subscriber base. According to the data, the broadband subscriber base grew 2.08 per cent from 10.08 mn in August to 10.29 mn in September 2010. However, there has been a further decline in the wireline segment with the subscriber base going down from 35.77 mn in August-2010 to 35.57 mn by the end of September. Bharti continues to be the largest operator in the country with 20.84 per cent share of the market. Relience Communications and Vodafone are placed at the second and third spot respectively.
	Agro Tech 2010 to feature nine themes Tribune News Service Chandigarh, December 2 Over 225 exhibitors, including 63 from nine other countries, will be participating in the Agro Tech 2010, which begins tomorrow. Charu Mathur, regional director, CII northern region, said that nine concurrent shows would be on at Agro Tech 2010. These include ‘Agri Expo 2010’ which will showcase products for productivity enhancement; ‘Agricultural Resource Management’, a first-time show featuring companies engaged in agriculture conservation, water management, natural resource management, environment control & protection; ‘Farm Services 2010’ which will educate farmers on how to overcome operational challenges; ‘Farm Tech 2010’, which will look at promoting farm mechanization; ‘Food Expo 2010’, which will focus on processed food; ‘Food-Tech 2010’ which will be all about the rapidly growing Food Processing sector and ‘Livestock Expo 2010, which will showcase the latest technologies in Livestock Breeding, Management and Services. She said that there will also be a campaign on water conservation, jointly with Mahindra Swaraj, ‘ Jal Sangram - Surakshit Jal, Sunhera Kal’ to educate farmers on water management. and there will be an Apple Fest. Apart from this, CII is also organizing Kisan Ghostis, live demonstrations of best practices, International Buyer-Seller Meets and International Conferences on topics which would be of tremendous benefit to farmers and the corporate world.
	Interviews for next Sebi chief likely to be deferred New Delhi, December 2 A government panel set up for selecting the next capital market regulator may defer the final interview of short-listed candidates, earlier scheduled for tomorrow. The interviews for the post of Sebi Chairman may be postponed, possibly till later this month, after the selection committee, headed by Cabinet Secretary K M Chandrasekhar, decides on the new date tomorrow, sources said. The last-minute change in the schedule has been due to the volatile political situation at the Centre in the wake of a string of alleged scams that have surfaced in the recent past, as also pull-out from the process by some of the short-listed candidates, sources added. The panel was constituted by the Finance Ministry in September to find the successor to incumbent Sebi Chairman C B Bhave, whose term ends in February 2011. Those tipped to be leading the race include mutual fund industry body AMFI's Chairman, U K Sinha, and Corporate Affairs Secretary R Badyopadhyay. The interview of about half a dozen candidates were earlier scheduled to be held here on December 3. The panel, which also includes Finance Secretary Ashok Chawla, Financial Services Secretary R Gopalan and Department of Personnel Secretary Shantanu Consul as members, last met in early November to decide on the final list of candidates. Sources said the panel had considered about 20 persons and zeroed in on seven candidates at its last meeting, but some of them have opted out since then. Furthermore, reservations have been expressed about a couple of them by senior policymakers and regulators. Out of those selected for the final interviews, at least two--public sector lender SBI Chairman O P Bhatt and Reserve Bank Deputy Governor K C Chakrabarty---may not be interested in the position, sources said. Others short-listed for the final interview include Department of Disinvestment Additional Secretary S Pradhan, Madhya Pradesh Principal Secretary G P Singhal and two Managing Directors at SBI, S K Bhattacharya and R Sridharan.
	SEBI bars founders of 4 firms Mumbai, December 2 The Securities and Exchange Board of India on Thursday said it has barred founders and related entities of four firms from trading on the stock exchanges as these firms had indulged in "fraudulent and unfair" trade practices". The founders of Murli Industries, Ackruti City Ltd, Welspun Corp and Brushman India (BRUS.BO) have been directed not to deal in any securities of their group companies, it said. SEBI said that all four firms had raised funds through a qualified institutional placement or foreign currency convertible bonds during 2007-2009. — Reuters
	Food inflation at lowest in 18 months New Delhi, December 2 After staying put stubbornly at high levels for quite some time, food inflation finally entered single-digit after four months, sliding to a 18-month low of 8.60 per cent for the week ended November 20, as prices fell on Kharif crop arrivals in the market It was at this low way back in May 2009. Food inflation, which has declined 7 weeks in a row, was at 10.15 per cent for the week ended November 13. It had recorded single-digit level for the week ended July 24, when it had fallen to 9.53 per cent. However, on annual basis, items like onions, fruits and milk became costlier. Overall, the slide will help the Reserve Bank breath easy while formulating monetary policy, as the economy too is on a high growth path. GDP showed an impressive 8.9 per cent growth in the first half of the current fiscal. "Decrease in food inflation is good... I hope it will come down further," Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee told reporters here. Experts said the low rate could help bring down the overall inflation to government projection of 5.5 per cent by March end." — Reuters
	Natural gas prices hiked 10% New Delhi, December 2 The government has approved 10 per cent hike in price of natural gas that state-owned firms like Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) sell to consumers in non-priority sectors such as steel and petrochemicals. “Effective December 1, ONGC and OIL have been allowed to charge up to $5.25 per million British thermal unit for 7-8 million standard cubic metres per day of gas that is sold to non-power and non-fertiliser sector,” a senior government official said. The rates would be excluding cess, transportation charge, marketing margin/service charge and taxes. Natural gas produced by ONGC and Oil India Ltd (OIL) from fields given to them on nomination basis is sold at government controlled price, called APM (Administered Pricing Mechanism) rate. — PTI