Hero resolves issues with striking workers at Haridwar

Aug 31, 2013, 07.31 PM IST

Labour trouble erupted at the company's Haridwar unit when a worker was sacked on disciplinary grounds. The workers there were demanding the creation of a new Union Body.

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Hero resolves issues with striking workers at Haridwar

Labour trouble erupted at the company's Haridwar unit when a worker was sacked on disciplinary grounds. The workers there were demanding the creation of a new Union Body.

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Hero resolves issues with striking workers at Haridwar

Labour trouble erupted at the company's Haridwar unit when a worker was sacked on disciplinary grounds. The workers there were demanding the creation of a new Union Body.

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Moneycontrol Bureau

Hero Motocorp has amicably resolved its issues with workers striking at its Haridwar plant, the company told CNBC-TV18. All protesting workers have returned and despatches from the Haridwar plant are going on, the company added.

The company said the impact of the strike on production was insignificant, though the workers claimed that production at the plant had come to a complete halt.

Also Read: Labour trouble halts production at Hero's Haridwar plant

Hero Motocorp on Friday served show-cause notice to a worker for misrepresenting facts. Issue arose when the company sacked one worker on disciplinary grounds. The workers were demanding his reinstatement. They were also demanding the creation of a Union Body.

Haridwar plant is the only unit of the company that does not have a workers union. Hero Motocorp has three plants, one each in Gurgaon, Dharuhera and Haridwar. The Haridwar plant is the company's largest manufacturing facility, with daily capacity of about 8,000 units.

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Net4 India MD held for not depositing service tax

The Service Tax department has arrested Net4 India Ltd Managing Director Jasjit Singh Sawhney for non-payment of the levy to the tune of Rs 9 crore. Sawhney was arrested by Service Tax department officers on August 30 for the company's pending liability of about Rs 9 crore for the financial year 2012-13, an official said.

"A major chunk of this liability has been collected by the company from its clients as service tax to be paid to the government exchequer, but was not deposited with the government," the official added.

Also Read: GST roll out difficult until 2015, says Harsh Mariwala

The official said Sawhney was granted conditional bail up to September 3 by the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate in Patiala House Court today on payment of Rs 25 lakh. He has to pay Rs 75 lakh within 15 days and Rs 1 crore a month subsequently, the official added. This is the third arrest this fiscal by the department for failure to deposit service tax collected from customers.

Earlier, one person was arrested in Kolkata for non-payment of the levy to the tune of Rs 79 lakh and one person was held in Mumbai for dues of Rs 1.96 crore. According to the Finance Act, any person who has collected service tax of more than Rs 50 lakh and fails to deposit the amount with the government even six months after the due date can be imprisoned for up to seven years.

The department has identified 10 lakh people who have not filed service tax returns or have stopped filing them and may be liable for punishment.

In the budget, the government had come up with the Voluntary Compliance Encouragement Scheme under which defaulters can pay at least 50 percent of the arrears for the five-year period ending 2012, with the remainder payable over six months without interest.

Finance Minister P Chidambaram had attributed the large number of defaulters to benign provisions of the Service Tax Act. Service tax has emerged as a major source of revenue and the government proposes to collect Rs 1.8 lakh crore in the current fiscal, up from Rs 1.3 lakh crore last fiscal.

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MCX Chairman V Chary, 5 directors resign from Board

MCX Chairman Venkat Chary and five other directors on the commodity exchange board quit today following the implementation of new guidelines including those that bar any person over 70 years of age to hold a board position.
    
While Chary and C M Maniar, who was an Forward Market Commission-approved independent director on MCX, quit due to the age guideline, the exchange's former managing director Lambertus Rutten resigned citing pre-occupations.

Also read: Do not renew MCX-SX's license, say NSEL investors
    
P R Barpande too resigned due to pre-occupation, MCX said in a filing to the stock exchanges.
    
The development comes on the heels of NSEL defaulting on the second payout for settling Rs 5,600 crore dues after it suspended trade on July 31 following government's direction in the wake of violation of certain rules.
    
Both National Spot Exchange Ltd (NSEL) and MCX are promoted by the Jignesh Shah-headed Financial Technologies India Ltd (FTIL).  MCX also said: "...the exchange has earmarked Rs 232.39 crore as initial settlement guarantee fund (SGF) and that the exchange will always remain in compliance with SGF guidelines of FMC as may be prescribed from time to time."
    
Meanwhile, FMC nominated independent director Prakash Apte has also resigned with effect from August 31 and has been replaced by Santosh Kumar Mohanty by the regulator. Shareholder Director Shvetal Vakil resigned from the Board due to the term criteria prescribed in the guidelines. Whereas, the resignations of Chary, Maniar, Vakil, Apte and Rutten are effective from August 31, 2013, that of Barpande's is effective from today, the filing added.

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Maruti Suzuki workers demand bail for 147 colleagues

Aug 30, 2013, 10.32 PM IST

Terminated workers and families of the jailed workers of the Maruti-Suzuki India Ltd (MSIL) Manesar plant organised a public hearing at Jantar Mantar. They narrated their agonies before the jury of Prabhat Patnaik, D R Chaudhry, former chairman HPSC, and Supreme Court advocates Kirti Singh, Colin Gonsalves and R S Hooda.

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Maruti Suzuki workers demand bail for 147 colleagues

Terminated workers and families of the jailed workers of the Maruti-Suzuki India Ltd (MSIL) Manesar plant organised a public hearing at Jantar Mantar. They narrated their agonies before the jury of Prabhat Patnaik, D R Chaudhry, former chairman HPSC, and Supreme Court advocates Kirti Singh, Colin Gonsalves and R S Hooda.

Like this story, share it with millions of investors on M3

Maruti Suzuki workers demand bail for 147 colleagues

Terminated workers and families of the jailed workers of the Maruti-Suzuki India Ltd (MSIL) Manesar plant organised a public hearing at Jantar Mantar. They narrated their agonies before the jury of Prabhat Patnaik, D R Chaudhry, former chairman HPSC, and Supreme Court advocates Kirti Singh, Colin Gonsalves and R S Hooda.

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Maruti Suzuki workers today demanded immediate bail for their 147 colleagues who are in jail in connection with the alleged murder of a man during last year's violence in the car manufacturer's Manesar plant.

Terminated workers and families of the jailed workers of the Maruti-Suzuki India Ltd (MSIL) Manesar plant organised a public hearing at Jantar Mantar here. They narrated their agonies before the jury of Prabhat Patnaik, D R Chaudhry, former chairman HPSC, and Supreme Court advocates Kirti Singh, Colin Gonsalves and R S Hooda.

Also read: Auto sector bets on rural market to boost sales

CPI(M) leaders Sitaram Yechury and Brinda Karat, CPI leader Gurudas Dasgupta, TDP leader N Nageshwar Rao and other trade union leaders also expressed their solidarity with the jailed and terminated MSIL workers and their families.

Later, a delegation led by MP Basudeb Acharia met NHRC Chairperson Justice (retd) K G Balakrishnan who assured them that it would take necessary action.

The jury said 147 workers were being charged for murder of one person, which defies all credibility and no proper probe was conducted. Terming denial of bail to the workers, the jury members said those who have been arrested have been kept in jail for more than one year in gross violation of human rights.

"Even those who have shown any sympathy with the workers have been subjected to brutal treatment by police on several occasions. And no help, medical of otherwise, were provided to the affected families even in cases where they were entitled to such help," the jury said.

They claimed the entire conflict arose because the workers wanted to form a union of their own. The other demands of the workers included impartial and high level judicial inquiry to probe July 18, 2012 incident. The workers also demanded ensuring workers right of forming and joining a trade union of their own choice and stop police intervention.

Tags: Maruti Suzuki, workers, Manesar plant, jury, Prabhat Patnaik, D R Chaudhry, Colin Gonsalves, Kirti Singh, TDP leader N Nageshwar Rao , CPI leader Gurudas Dasgupta, Brinda Karat, Sitaram Yechury

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SBI raises interest rate on bulk deposits by up to 1.5%

Aug 29, 2013, 09.32 PM IST

State Bank of India today raised interest rates by up to 1.5 percent on bulk deposits of over Rs 1 crore. The interest rate for bulk deposits for the tenors 7-60 days will be 9 per cent, SBI, the country's largest bank, said in a statement.

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SBI raises interest rate on bulk deposits by up to 1.5%

State Bank of India today raised interest rates by up to 1.5 percent on bulk deposits of over Rs 1 crore. The interest rate for bulk deposits for the tenors 7-60 days will be 9 per cent, SBI, the country's largest bank, said in a statement.

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SBI raises interest rate on bulk deposits by up to 1.5%

State Bank of India today raised interest rates by up to 1.5 percent on bulk deposits of over Rs 1 crore. The interest rate for bulk deposits for the tenors 7-60 days will be 9 per cent, SBI, the country's largest bank, said in a statement.

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Faced with tight liquidity condition, State Bank of India today raised interest rates by up to 1.5 percent on bulk deposits of over Rs 1 crore.

The interest rate for bulk deposits for the tenors 7-60 days will be 9 per cent, SBI, the country's largest bank, said in a statement. Fixed deposits between 61 days to less than one year will be 8.25 per cent, it said.

Also read: India picks seven banks for 5% stake sale in Coal India

The new rates would be effective from August 31, it added. The bank had last revised interest rate on fixed deposits over Rs 1 crore on June 7.

As per the existing rate structure, the bank is paying interest rate of 7.5 per cent on term deposits of 7-180 days. Cost of funds have gone up for banks as the Reserve Bank has taken a series of steps to check the fall of rupee against the US dollar.

In order to contain rupee depreciation, RBI has taken slew of measures in the past couple of weeks resulting in the tight liquidity situation for commercial banks.

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Idea may get new licences soon

The DoT may soon issue new telecom licences to Idea Cellular which had earlier refused to accept guidelines related to 3G roaming pacts in the unified license, sources said. The new licence agreement between DoT and Idea may also incorporate certain clauses proposed by Idea, they added.

The Department had said that it was illegal for telecom operators to sell 3G services in areas where they do not have spectrum. Telecom companies Airtel , Vodafone and Idea Cellular had contested the DoT's point and the matter is now sub-judice.

Also read: Vodafone shares hit 12-year high on Verizon talks

Telecom tribunal TDSAT had given a split verdict on the dispute between DoT and the three operators over 3G intra-circle roaming pacts. The matter is now pending with the Delhi High Court.

Idea had earlier refused to sign new telecom permit (Unified Licence) as it barred operators from entering into 3G intra-circle roaming agreement. The company had said the norms can be implemented only after final judgement of the court.
    
The DoT and Idea Cellular, sources said, have agreed to follow the court order with respect to implementation of norms related to 3G roaming pacts in new licences and the same has been approved by Minister of Communications and IT Kapil Sibal.
    
"The approval of the minister has been obtained to sign the UL with Idea Cellular with addition of the above mentioned condition in the UL (AS) for Assam, West Bengal, North East, Tamil Nadu and Kolkata service area," official sources said.

When contacted Idea Cellular refused to comment on the development. Idea had emerged second biggest winner by getting spectrum in 8 circles which included all the seven circles where its licences were cancelled and an additional win in Bihar where it licences were unaffected by the apex court order that cancelled 122 telecom permits in 2G scam.
    
The seven circles where it had to take Unified Licences to operate include Assam, Jammu and Kashmir, Kolkata, North East, Orissa, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal.

DoT has also suggested signing Unified Licence agreement for Jammu and Kashmir and Orissa service areas where there is no mention of 3G roaming pact norms.

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IT stocks benefit from rupee fall, but for how long?

Even as a strong bear grip chokes the market the IT companies are having a party on the street and it's all being sponsored by the rupee. As the currency crashes to a shocking 68 against the dollar, sectors like oil and gas are running for cover, while export-dependent tech majors are touching lifetime highs reports CNBC-TV18's Kritika Saxena.

A look at the top stocks on the Nifty today, one will see that HCL Tech  and Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) touched lifetime highs and Infosys and Wipro jumped 35 to 18 percent (year-to-date) respectively.

Also Read: Infosys board member and Americas head Ashok Vemuri resigns

But considering the overall market is under a strong bear-grip, these IT companies are up due to depreciating rupee. While the rest of the market remains spooked with the rupee's unprecedented fall, IT stocks are rallying due to the short term benefit of the INR's depreciation on their topline.

Though the next few quarters are expected to continue to show gains, experts say falling rupee will eventually lead to an overhaul in pricing structure, steep escalation in overhead costs and will force IT firms to hit the pause button on acquisition plans.

Will this impact plans of Indian companies looking to acquire overseas?

Sanjoy Sen, Senior director, Deloitte says "Yes, simply because acquiring overseas will become much more expensive and so, foreign receivables will go up.

According to Sen, historically, a lot of pricing has been in dollars, pounds or euros based on where the customer is based. "In recent years we have seen some companies expressing their contracts in rupee denominations; for them the procurement will become much cheaper but will work against the Indian companies that are providing services," he adds.

This means that companies who want to stay afloat in the long term have to innovate; by establishing pay per usage contracts in place of fixed price contracts; leveraging cloud to optimally utilise resources and create a stronger near shore presence with the client.

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Auto sector bets on rural market to boost sales

Aug 28, 2013, 10.06 PM IST

Despite the industry slumping almost 10 percent, the rural markets however have grown at an astounding 20 percent. Auto majors from Maruti Suzuki, Hyundai to M&M are putting in place a strategy to woo the discerning rural customers with an addressable market of at least 50,000 potential buyers.

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Auto sector bets on rural market to boost sales

Despite the industry slumping almost 10 percent, the rural markets however have grown at an astounding 20 percent. Auto majors from Maruti Suzuki, Hyundai to M&M are putting in place a strategy to woo the discerning rural customers with an addressable market of at least 50,000 potential buyers.

Like this story, share it with millions of investors on M3

Auto sector bets on rural market to boost sales

Despite the industry slumping almost 10 percent, the rural markets however have grown at an astounding 20 percent. Auto majors from Maruti Suzuki, Hyundai to M&M are putting in place a strategy to woo the discerning rural customers with an addressable market of at least 50,000 potential buyers.

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It's a torrid time for the auto industry. Hit by the worst slump in a decade the industry is staring at yet another forgettable year. Despite the doom and gloom in practically every developed city of the country, it is the rural belt that is saving the industry the blushes reports CNBC-TV18's Ronojoy Banerjee.

Also Read: Patel pitches for stimulus package for auto sector

Auto majors from Maruti Suzuki , Hyundai to Mahindra and Mahindra (M&M) are quietly putting in place a strategy to woo the discerning rural customers in areas with an addressable market of at least 50,000 potential buyers. Despite the industry slumping almost 10 percent, the rural markets however have grown at an astounding 20 percent.

A clutch of factors ranging from easier finance to good monsoons has helped increase disposable incomes. Maruti Suzuki's rural sales have risen to over 30 percent versus 5 percent five years ago.

Mayank Pareek, COO - Marketing & Sales, Maruti Suzuki says "One positive is rural. Overall our sales have declined by 4 percent but our rural growth has been 30 percent. Currently, our share of rural sales stands at 30 percent."

Since April this year Maruti has opened over 20 new sales outlets in these regions. Rival Hyundai too is increasing its rural focus. Over the next six months the company will add 80 rural sales outlets to its existing 270.

According to Rakesh Srivastava, senior VP - Sales & Marketing, Hyundai, in the last two years there has been a noticeable upward sales trend. In 2011 around 15 percent of sales came from the rural and semi urban markets. In 2012, it grew to 16.9 percent and in 2013 it grew to 18.6 percent and we expect it to increase to over 20 percent by 2014."

M&M, which has the strongest rural presence owing to products like the Bolero, says its share will only go up. Currently, 37 percent of M&M's sales come from these markets up from about 32 percent till a few years back. The company is tying up with financial institutions like regional rural banks for boosting rural sales.

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Power sector to get gas, but quantum a worry: GVK Power

"From March onwards, we have not been getting gas for our power projects," says A Issac George, Director & CFO, GVK Power and Infrastructure . One of the reasons why this has happened is because all the gas was diverted to fertiliser plants, he adds.

Also Read: Power biz a concern, airport division promising: GVK Power

The shift to power projects may be a positive development, but it all depends on the quantum of gas that will be made available for the power sector, he says. Unless and until the quantum of gas is enough to operate power projects at 70-80 percent capacity, it will not make much sense because the losses on account of heat rate would be substantial, he adds.

Below is the verbatim transcript of A Issac George's interview on CNBC-TV18

Q: In the last few weeks, we have seen the government moving ahead on the clearing fuel supply agreements (FSA) logjam as well promising gas to some of the gas-based power companies, is the situation better on the ground for power companies?

A: We are in the same situation as we were a couple of months back. From March onwards, we have not been getting gas for our power projects. Two of our power projects are still shut down for want of gas. The third gas power project that we have operates only at 50 percent capacity.

One of the reasons why this has happened is basically because all the gas was diverted to fertiliser and power projects have not received the gas. Now with the shift that we are looking at possibly there would be some sort of positive development but one does not know what is the quantum of gas that would be available for the power sector. That is very critical.

Please understand that these power projects have to operate at a minimum load so that they operate efficiently. So unless and until you get gas to operate the power projects at something like 70-80 percent capacity, it will not make much sense because the losses on account of heat rate would be substantial. So I cannot comment on this unless and until I know what is the quantum of gas that would be available for power projects.

Q: You spoke about power but what about the infrastructure space, we did see CCI agreeing to reschedule premiums for public private partnership (PPP) highway projects, if that comes through how much of an improvement could it be for infrastructure projects like yours?

A: That is pretty positive. What the government is now proposing is that premium payment can be backended with NPV remaining the same. The question that we have a concern on is there discounting rates that is used for arising of the NPV. That is we have been given to understand earlier that discounting rates will be 10 percent, but now I have given to understand that it is going to be 12 percent. That will make a substantial difference. It can make or break projects. One has to look at the possibility of bringing it back to 10 percent because basically, the discounting rate is a factor of so many things for example, government yield on bonds etc are the parameters which are used to arrive at the same rate. So I did not understand the logic of taking the discounting rates from 10 percent to 12 percent.

Q: We may be getting ahead of ourselves in that. Do you expect other bidders to challenge because you are changing the terms of contract?

A: There is a possibility, but if the government has the will, I am sure things can go through without any problem.

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RIL cooperating unconditionally with CAG

Aug 27, 2013, 05.01 PM IST

Reliance Industries has agreed to provide access to all records and cooperate unconditionally with the CAG for audit on its spending in the flagging KG-D6 gas fields, the Oil Ministry said today.

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RIL cooperating unconditionally with CAG

Reliance Industries has agreed to provide access to all records and cooperate unconditionally with the CAG for audit on its spending in the flagging KG-D6 gas fields, the Oil Ministry said today.

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RIL cooperating unconditionally with CAG

Reliance Industries has agreed to provide access to all records and cooperate unconditionally with the CAG for audit on its spending in the flagging KG-D6 gas fields, the Oil Ministry said today.

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Reliance Industries has agreed to provide access to all records and cooperate unconditionally with the CAG for audit on its spending in the flagging KG-D6 gas fields, the Oil Ministry said today.
    
Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas Panabaka Lakshmi, in a written statement to the Rajya Sabha, corrected a reply she had given on August 6 wherein she had stated that the Comptroller & Auditor General of India (CAG) was doing a "performance" audit of KG-D6 block.

Also read: 12 power plants solely dependent on KG-D6 gas lying idle
    
A statement that Lakshmi laid on the table of the Rajya Sabha said it was to correct "the error by deleting the word performance" audit in the reply given on August 8.
    
"The Ministry has taken seriously the issue raised by CAG in audit of KG-D6 block. Initially, there were certain issues being raised by the operator, RIL, relating to scope and coverage of audit to be conducted by the CAG. Due to this, there was a delay in taking up the audit.
    
"However, these issues have since been resolve with continuous engagement of government with audit as well as the operator. Consequently, RIL has agreed to provide access to all records and cooperate unconditionally with regard to audit of the block KG-DWN-98/3 (KG-D6). Audit by the CAG is currently under progress," she said.     

CAG Principal Director of Audit (Economic and Service Ministries) A M Bajaj had last month written a letter to the ministry stating that RIL was providing information sought in phases and some records sought were still pending.
    
CAG, at the request of the Oil Ministry, is auditing KG-D6 spending for 2008-09 to 2011-12. It restarted the audit in April after issues like scope and extent of its scrutiny
were resolved.     

RIL had previously stated that CAG cannot contractually perform a performance audit on it and Production Sharing Contract (PSC) only provides for a government appointed auditor to verify reasonableness of all charges and credits.
    
CAG too has stated that it is not planning to do a performance audit of the company but only wants to examine "propriety" of expenses made. For doing that CAG has been given the discretion of requisitioning records as it deems fit.
    
In the August 6 reply, Lakshmi had stated that "RIL has agreed to provide access to all records and cooperate unconditionally with regard to performance audit of the block KG-DWN-98/3 (KG-D6)."

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