The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

	Iranian crude: Deadlock over payment ends India to make payment in euros via German bank New Delhi, February 3 Ending a six-week long stalemate, India today decided to use euro to pay for Iranian crude oil but will route the payment through a German bank instead of its central bank. Banks like State Bank of India (SBI) had refused to facilitate payments for Iranian oil after RBI on December 23 clamped down on the main conduit used by the Indian companies to pay for the Persian Gulf nation imports, which make up for over 12 per cent of the nation's oil needs. But, Iran had continued to supply oil on credit despite the outstanding amount crossing a staggering $3 billion. "It was decided today that euro payments will be made through Hamburg-based Europäisch-Iranische Handelsbank AG (EIH Bank)," a finance ministry official said after a high-level meeting called to end the deadlock. The meeting was attended by National Security Advisor Shiv Shankar Menon, Economic Affairs Secretary R Gopalan, Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao and Oil Secretary S Sundareshan. "SBI has been instructed to start clearing the backlog payments beginning this evening," the official said. Oil companies like Essar Oil will transfer money to SBI who in turn will use its Frankfurt branch to route payments to EIH. The nation's largest lender will first clear the over $2 billion payment backlog for the four-month period beginning September 2010. An additional $1.3 billion worth of oil was bought after December 23, when the Reserve Bank of India disallowed payments for Iranian crude using a long-standing clearing house system run by the central banks of nine countries, including India and Iran, dubbed as the Asian Clearing Union. — PTI Egypt crisis may trigger rise in air fares New Delhi, February 3 A sharp rise in the price of aviation fuel due to present political turnmoil in Egypt and fears of a domino effect on other oil-producing countries in the region is likely to trigger a hike in air fares. "The recent sharp rise in fuel prices, at a time when load factors remain higher, will put further upward pressure on both fares and yields," an IATA report said. The Middle-East political turmoil has pushed the oil prices close to $100 a barrel and jet fuel to $113 a barrel, considerably higher than the $91 per barrel average for 2009. "The story this month is the sharp rise in oil prices. We predicted that 2011 would see a consecutive second year of profitability but industry profits fell by 40 per cent to $9.1 billion. This was based on an oil price of $84 per barrel (Brent)," IATA Director-General and CEO, Giovanni Bisignani said in a statement from Geneva. Fuel accounts for 27 per cent of operating costs and a sustained rise in oil price could spoil the party. With uncertainties in the Middle-East, oil prices are now hovering near the $100 per barrel mark. For every dollar increase in the average price of a barrel of oil over the year, airlines face the difficult task of recovering an additional $1.6 billion in costs, said Bisignani. — PTI
	UK Sinha to head SEBI New Delhi, February 3 The government today appointed UTI AMC chief UK Sinha as the Chairman of capital markets regulator, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI).A 1976-batch IAS officer of the Bihar cadre, Sinha replaces CB Bhave who retires on February 17. Sinha has been appointed as SEBI chief for a period of three years from February 18, 2011, said a notification issued by the government today. He will be the eighth chief of SEBI. "...(Sinha) has been appointed as the Chairman, SEBI, initially for a period of three years with effect from the date he assumes charge of the post on or after February 18, 2011 or till he attains the age of 65 years or until further orders, whichever is earlier," it said. Sinha, at present, is the chairman and managing director of UTI AMC. He also heads the mutual fund industry body AMFI. — PTI
	Want to buy Swift or Dzire? Waiting time still 3-5 months Ruchika M. Khanna/TNS Chandigarh, February 3 Planning to buy a new Wagon R VXI, Swift or Dzire? Well, be prepared to wait for a few months to get the delivery, after you have made the booking. These best-selling models from the stable of Maruti Suzuki have a waiting period ranging from three to five months. And the situation will continue to remain like this till the end of the year, when the second plant of the company gets commissioned at Manesar. Talking to TNS here today, Shashank Srivastava, chief general manager, marketing, Maruti Suzuki India, said these cars were in high demand, but presently the production was not in pace with the demand. He said in the past one year, the company had doubled the production of Swift and Dzire models. “From 7,000 units of Swift in 2009-10, we have increased its production to 12,000 units per month. The production of Dzire, too, has gone up from 4,000 units per month last year to 9,000 units per month this year ,” he said. He added that though initially the new plant at Manesar was expected to be commissioned by March 2011, the company had now stepped up efforts to start the plant in the third quarter (between October to December 2011) this year. The company is also going to set up at least four new stockyards, besides the existing one at its manufacturing facility in Manesar. “We will be setting up regional stockyards in a phased manner so as to reduce the delivery time of vehicles to dealerships, with the first one coming up in Bangalore. We are also considering setting up these stockyards in Nashik, Nagpur and Siliguri,” he added. In town to launch the new luxury sedan, Kizashi, he said the company was now working to erect a test track at its third plant in Rohtak, with an investment of Rs 1,000 crore. Nippo has been hired as a consultant for this test track, which will initiate the launch of 100 per cent indigenous car for domestic market by 2012.
	Corporate Results Ambuja Cements’ profit up 4 pc New Delhi, February 3 Ambuja Cements today reported a four per cent increase in its consolidated net profit to Rs 1,262.97 crore for the calendar year 2010, helped by higher production and sales of the key construction material. The company had posted a net profit of Rs 1,216.84 crore in the calendar year 2009, the company said. The net sales rose by 4.4 per cent to Rs 7,390.21 crore in 2010 as against Rs 7,076.87 crore in the previous year. Jamna Auto net up 38 pc Jamna Auto Industries today reported 38.28 per cent jump in its consolidated net profit for the quarter ended December 31, 2010, at Rs 6.61 crore. The consolidated operational revenue also increased by 41.09 per cent to Rs 239.24 from Rs 169.56 crore in the year-ago period, it added. The board of the company also approved an interim dividend of 10 per cent. Whirlpool net up 49 pc Consumer durable major Whirlpool today said its net profit rose by 49.13 per cent to Rs 24.10 crore for the quarter ended December 31, 2010 from the same period last fiscal. The company's net sales for the third quarter ended December 2010 rose to Rs 600.27 crore from Rs 504.15 crore in the same period last fiscal. — PTI
	11 lakh mobile users opt for portability New Delhi, February 3 Within a fortnight of Mobile Number Portability becoming available, more than 11 lakh mobile subscribers have opted for the facility, that allows users to change their service provider while retaining the number. "According to daily MNP figure reported by telecom service providers, there has been request from over 11 lakh customers to switch from their existing network," said a TRAI official. The official added that TRAI is busy in classifying the data that have been received by the authority. TRAI has plans to include MNP data in subscriber report for the month of January. "We have started collecting country wide data from operators now. We have MNP statistics for the month of last December but it is likely that complete MNP statistics will be made public in telecom subscription data for month of January," he added. MNP services were first launched in Haryana in November last year. Companies like Idea Cellular and Vodafone had started marketing their services even before the nationwide roll-out of MNP to woo subscribers from other networks that were already looking at switching operators. With the rollout of MNP, subscribers will look at changing operators if they are not satisfied with the network coverage or customer care services, say operators. Customers will have to pay a maximum of Rs 19 to an operator to change their network and the new operator has the option to either waive the fee or reduce it. However, a consumer would be required to continue with an operator for a minimum period of three months in order to avail the MNP service. — PTI
	Excise duty evasion worth Rs1.28 cr detected Anuja Jaiswal Tribune News Service Chandigarh, February 3 The Central Excise Division has detected evasion of excise duty worth Rs 1.28 crore by a filament unit of JCT Limited (synthetic fibres division), Hoshiarpur. The duty was allegedly evaded by wrongly availing the benefits of central value added tax (Cenvat) credit. Confirming the move, Chief Commissioner (North West region), PK Sirohi, said Ludhiana commissionerate has registered a case of evasion for the period of October 2009 to December 2010. He said the company was availing Cenvat credit on inputs used in the manufacture of nylon filament yarn. He said as per the notification No 30/2004, in case a company avails Cenvat on inputs used in the manufacture of yarn then they had to pay a duty of 8 per cent upto February 20, 2010 and 10 per cent thereafter. However, the unit was availing the benefit of Cenvat Credit Rules, 2004, and only paying an amount of 5 per cent of the value of clearance. Consequently, the company has short paid duty to the tune of Rs 1.28 crore during this period.
	Women hostels to be set up in industrial hubs Amaninder Pal/TNS Jalandhar, February 3 To overcome industrial labour shortage in Punjab, the government is mulling a scheme to provide employment to rural women in the industrial sector. For this, women hostels would be set up in major industrial hubs of the state. Industrialists have consistently mooted the idea of employing local workers, especially women, who till now have been home makers only. Medium Industry Development Board VC Satish Kumar Dhanda said that under the scheme, industrialists could avail government subsidies and loans at very low interest rate for the construction of such hostels. As of now, residential facilities cannot be developed at industrial focal points without paying Change of Land Use (CLU) charges.
	Aegis to hire 11,000 in FY12 Dubai, February 3 Aegis, the BPO arm of $15-billion Essar Group, today said it plans to add about 11,000 people globally, including India, during the financial year 2011-12. Aegis has more than 50,000 employees across 11 countries. "Globally, we should add 11,000 people by March 2012," Aegis MD and Global CEO Aparup Sengupta said here. He, however, declined to comment on country-specific details. The company serves verticals such as BFSI (banking, financial services and insurance), telecom, retail, healthcare, travel and hospitality, consumer goods and technology. Aegis has recently bagged a contract worth $2 billion from Saudi Telecom for managing the customer care operations of the telecom firm. — PTI