Bangalore, April 22
Ending the over month-long stalemate, employees of Toyota Kirloskar Motor resumed work today at the company's two Bidadi plants near here after the Karnataka Government asked both the management and the Union to restore normalcy in operations.

"We have resumed work today as per the orders of the Karnataka Government; about 2,000 employees have reported to work in the first shift at 5:45 am, another group has reported to second shift at 2:45 pm," Toyota Kirloskar Motor Employees Union general secretary R Satish said.

However, he said they will continue to contest with management on issues, including wages and suspension of 30 employees.

About 4,200-member Union at its general body meeting held last evening had decided to resume work from today following the Karnataka Government's order to both the management and the union to restore normalcy in operations.

The company in response to a query said, "All workmen have come to work as planned." Toyota's operations had been affected ever since the union demanded a wage hike of Rs 4,000 as against Rs 3,050 proposed by the management.

Toyota Kirloskar Motor, a subsidiary of Toyota Motor Corp of Japan, had on March 16 declared a lockout, after talks between the management and union over wages failed.

The lockout was lifted on March 24, but employees did not resume work as they objected to signing a good conduct undertaking as demanded by the company and pressed for withdrawal of suspension orders. — PTI 

New Delhi, April 22
India’s third largest bank, HDFC Bank today posted a 23.1% increase in net profit to Rs 2,326.52 crore in the January-March quarter of 2013-14. This is its slowest growth in a decade. It had a profit of Rs 1,889.84 crore in the corresponding quarter last year.

Total income rose 14.9% to Rs 12,790 crore from Rs 11,127.5 crore a year earlier.

Net interest income (interest earned less interest expended) for the quarter grew 15.3% to Rs 4,952.6 crore, driven by average asset growth of 20.3%.

For the financial year 2013-14, the bank posted a net profit of Rs 8,478.4 crore, an increase of 26% from Rs 6,726.28 crore in the previous year.

Saday Sinha, banking analyst, Kotak Securities, said the numbers came largely in line with expectations. Retail book saw moderate growth while corporate book grew at a faster pace and asset quality did not spring any negative surprise and remained stable, he said. 

New Delhi, April 22
India has concluded an 'in substance' agreement with the US to combat possible tax evasion by Americans through Indian financial entities.

The 'in substance' agreement with India under Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) was concluded on April 11, the US Treasury said.

Market regulator SEBI plans to issue guidelines for market intermediaries in this regard this fiscal, sources said.

The US said India has consented to Model 1 - Inter-governmental Agreement (IGA) under FATCA.

As per Model 1, financial entities will be required to report information on US account holders to the US IRS (internal revenue service) through CBDT.

The FATCA requires the US government to sign IGAs with various countries, including India, where American individuals and companies may hold accounts and other assets.

"Regulatory measures from SEBI and other regulators after the signing of this IGA would immensely help Indian financial institutions to cope up with this complex regulation," said Amit Maheshwari, Partner Ashok Maheshwary & Associates.

He said other regulators like RBI are also expected to issue guidelines to ensure compliance of FATCA.

Signing of IGA coupled with regulatory measures from SEBI would be helpful for Indian financial institutions and corporates to better comply with this significant legislation, experts said.

SEBI was asked to examine the applicability of the FATCA provisions to all market intermediaries regulated by the capital markets regulator. This was examined by SEBI in coordination with the Finance Ministry. — PTI

New Delhi, April 22
GlaxoSmithKline Asia has slashed the price of fever and pain-relief pill Crocin Advance tablets across the country by around 50% in order to conform to the price notified under DPCO, 2013.

GlaxoSmithKline Asia (GSKAP), which takes care of all non-nutrition products, has decided to reduce the price of the drug after getting a response from National Pharmaceuticals Pricing Authority (NPPA) on the application seeking exemption for Crocin Advance Paracetamol Fast Release 500 mg tablet under the provisions of the Drugs Price Control Order (DPCO), 2013.

"GSKAP is reducing price of Crocin Advance Paracetamol Fast Release 500 mg tablet to conform to the price notified under DPCO, 2013 with immediate effect," GSKAP said. — PTI

New Delhi, April 22
Urging India to consider NRIs as "its own", London-based industrialist Lord Swraj Paul said they have remitted almost $65 billion in the past six months through deposits in the country.

Lord Paul, who is founder-chairman of the UK-based Caparo Group, regretted that India "tends to forget" the contribution of non-resident Indians (NRIs) to the country's development.

"Even now, as late as last year or this year, when the financial crisis hit India, they (the government) are finding our banks are suffering from a lot of non-performing assets (NPAs). The NRIs have come to the country on the call of RBI," he said at a dinner hosted in his honour by the NRI Institute here last night.

"Almost $65 billion have come in the last six months from NRI deposits," Lord Paul added.

"Somehow, India tends to forget what the NRIs have contributed. They are the ones who came to India's help in the 1990s, when the government of India opened the business...," he added.

Lord Paul said he hoped the Indian government and the people would consider NRIs as their own. He said the community is as proud of India as anybody in India.

Lord Paul also said political parties should focus on real issues, such as education and poverty alleviation, for the betterment of the country.

"Nobody has talked about education, nobody has talked about what is the condition of the people below the poverty line. Isn't it time that voters should demand some explanation from all the political parties, why they are not going, where they should be? I hope some day good sense will prevail," he said. — PTI 

New Delhi, April 22
Micromax today launched its new six-inch phablet 'Canvas Doodle 3' for Rs 8,500. The Android-based-device is powered by a 1.3 GHz dual core processor, 4GB ROM and 512 MB RAM (expandable memory up to 32 GB).

It comes with a 5 MP rear camera, 0.3 MP front camera, 2500 mAh battery and preloaded with M! Doodle, Bigflix, M!live, Getit, Kingsoft Office and Opera apps. — PTI

BRIEFLY

MRF Q2 net declines 19% to Rs 171 crore
New Delhi: Tyre maker MRF today reported 18.86% decline in net profit at Rs 170.87 crore for the quarter ended March 31, 2013. However, net sales of the company rose to Rs 3,297.40 crore for the second quarter as compared to Rs 2,904.77 crore in the same period of previous fiscal, MRF said. — PTI

Microsoft launches tab for college goers
New Delhi: Microsoft has partnered with HP and Pearson to launch a tablet for higher educational students in engineering and management streams. The companies will jointly launch the Windows 8.1-powered 10.1-inch HP Omni10 tablet, priced at Rs 29,999, with embedded content from Pearson and Microsoft Office in the higher education space. — PTI

Nokia unit may be used for contract manufacturing
Chennai: With Finnish handset maker Nokia stating the $7.2 billion deal with IT major Microsoft for sale of its mobile devices and services business might conclude by this week, the Chennai plant could become a contract manufacturing facility. The plant at Sriperumbudur near Chennai is one of Nokia's biggest facilities in the world, employing about 8,000 persons directly and about 12,000 indirectly. — PTI

NDRI begins sale of bajra biscuits
Karnal: The National Dairy Research Institute (NDRI) on Tuesday started a sale counter of iron-fortified milk protein-enriched bajra biscuits, developed by its scientists. Dr AK Srivastava, Director, NDRI, inaugurated the counter. He said the technology for making the biscuits has been transferred to Shri Shivani Agro, an Indore-based 
company. — TNS