Mumbai, February 26
The benchmark BSE Sensex today breached the 21,000-mark after a month, but settled the day a tad lower at 20,986.99, a gain of 135 points, amid mixed trends from global markets.

India's largest gas distributor GAIL rose 2.97% to end the day as the biggest Sensex gainer. Cigarette major ITC recorded a smart gain of 2.07%. IT stocks continued its winning streak for the second day. Wipro rose 1.38% to trade at its 52-week high level. Infosys was up 0.56%.

Brokers attributed the rally to short coverings by operators because February series of Futures and Options was expiring today.

"IT stocks continued to see buying interest, with Wipro making its 52-week high level. FIIs continued to show optimism in the Indian stock market and were net buyers, particularly for last two weeks, and this also boosted market sentiment," said Rakesh Goyal, senior vice-president, Bonanza Portfolio.

Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) bought shares worth Rs 423.41 crore yesterday, as per provisional data from stock exchanges.

The 30-share barometer resumed the day stable. It touched an intra-day high of 21,005.04 but lost a little momentum and ended at 20,986.99, a rise of 134.52 points from its last close.

In straight four sessions, Sensex has surged by 450.35 points or 2.19%.

The previous time the key index breached 21,000-level was on January 24, 2014, when it closed the day at 21,333 points. The 50-issue Nifty on the NSE also improved further by 38.75 points to 6,238.80.

Other major Sensex gainers were M&M 2%, Dr Reddy's Lab 1.77%, BHEL 1.63%, Sun Pharma 1.33%, Hero Motocorp 1.25%, Bajaj Auto 1.09%. Tata Steel plunged 3.23%, SSLT 2.62%, Tata Power 1.85% and Coal India 1.12%. — PTI 

New Delhi, February 26
The first-ever auction of coal mines began today with the government putting three mines in Jharkhand and West Bengal on the block for captive use. The much-delayed auction will feature mines that have total reserves of 500 million tonne.

The move comes after the Centre drew flak for delaying the auction and the CAG earlier saying that allotment of 57 mines to private firms without auction had resulted in a notional loss of Rs 1.8 lakh crore to the exchequer.

"The government has initiated auction of coal blocks by inviting applications for the first time, for allocating coal blocks through competitive bidding for specified end-users," an official statement said.

The Ministry of Coal has offered three blocks for auction for captive use for steel, cement and sponge iron companies — two in Jharkhand and one in West Bengal.

Last year, the government had allocated 17 coal mines to central and state public sector units, including four to NTPC.

It had planned to auction 54 coal blocks with total estimated reserves of about 18 billion tonne. "The bidders are required to bid above the prescribed floor price," the statement said.

The Cabinet last year in September had approved the methodology for auctioning coal blocks, providing for upfront and production-linked payments and benchmarking of coal sale prices.

The policy provides for production-linked payment on a rupee per tonne basis, plus a basic upfront payment of 10% of the intrinsic value of the coal block. — PTI

New Delhi, February 26
Country's second largest IT firm Infosys is in the process of spinning off products and platforms business into a separate subsidiary as part of efforts to focus on the next phase of growth.

The subsidiary will not include Infosys' signature banking software, Finacle.

"We are in the process of forming a subsidiary for our products and platforms business. Once formed, we will be able to share more details on the same. Finacle will not be part of this subsidiary," an Infosys spokesperson said. — PTI

Mumbai, February 26
Under flak from various quarters for raising rates, RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan today said the central bank is committed to the "strongest growth possible" and stressed it is on the same page as the Finance Ministry on this front.

"Note that the RBI is committed to getting the strongest growth possible, there is no difference between us and North Block on this," said Rajan, who has hiked rates thrice since taking over as Governor in September.

He was speaking at a fixed income industry (Fimmda-PDAI) event here where the media was not allowed and only given a copy of the speech.

North Block, which houses the Ministry of Finance, has not been pleased with the Reserve Bank's rate increases, given their impact on investor sentiment and growth in general.

Rajan justified his actions, saying the best way to foster sustainable growth in the current circumstances is through monetary stability, which is bringing down inflation over a reasonable period of time.

The Governor, who went against the majority view of an internal panel advising on the monetary policy and surprised all by hiking rates in January, also reiterated the central bank's determination to get retail inflation down to 8 per cent by January 2015 and 6 per cent by January 2016.

BRIEFLY

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DK Sarraf is new ONGC chief
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