Public sector lenders Canara Bank, Corporation Bank and Allahabad Bank have decided to lower interest rates on housing loans, preferring to keep their prime lending rates (PLRs) unchanged. ICICI Bank Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer K V Kamath has indicated that the country's second largest bank would review interest rates only in 2008-09.
The sell-off in the equity markets, especially by foreign institutional investors, could have a ripple effect across asset classes and adversely impact consumer spending.
Many banks have begun to work on plans to provide assistance to brokers to ensure they do not default on any payments amid a turbulent stock market, following the finance ministry's unofficial advice to them to explore ways of supporting market players. All the actions would be initiated within the prudential framework like adhering to the limit on capital market exposure, said a top executive of another PSB.
Cable operators body has demanded an equal footing with the DTH players.
Speaking at a press conference in Kolkata organised by TDSAT, N K Mangla, head of the regulatory department of Reliance Communication, said, "We plan to have a customer capacity of 8 million or 55 per cent of the population in 2008." Reliance also plans to cover 95 per cent of highways, 93 per cent of railways, 6,000 towns and five lakh villages in 2008. Currently, the company has 22,000 towers.
The group is set to become the second largest Indian corporate in terms of market value.
With domestic savings rising, there is strong case that they may; but, equally, it may be premature to underestimate the potency of foreign flows.
Legal and judicial reforms are required for the development of financial systems and to create a favourable environment for growth of entrepreneurship, says the initial recommendations of an Indo-American joint working group deliberating on how to drive entrepreneurial growth in India.
Bangalore-based software giant has teamed up with eminent cartoonist Mario Miranda to create an advertising campaign that will light up its recruitment brand. The Goa-based cartoonist will educate potential recruits about Wipro through his characters.
Indian television company NDTV is in advanced stages of negotiations with NBC Universal, a subsidiary of New York Stock Exchange-listed General Electric to sell between 25 and 30 per cent in its UK-based subsidiary NDTV Networks Plc.
The chairman of the Securities and Exchange Board of India, M Damodaran, said on Wednesday public sector companies will have to comply with Clause 49 of the listing agreement for stock exchanges. However, few government-owned companies have met the Clause 49 stipulation (the table shows the state of play in some large government-owned companies).
A majority of the CEOs polled said the emerging political situation at the Centre could derail the pending economic reforms agenda (nuclear power, foreign direct investment in retail, etc).
Tata Motors is expected to unveil its Rs 1-lakh car, which has been the subject of much debate recently and is now being called the People's Car by the company. Maruti Suzuki will showcase two small cars, the A-Star and the Splash. Both these cars are headed for the Indian roads.
The government will soon announce a slew of tax incentives for infrastructure and technological upgrade in the TV and entertainment sector.
According to its promoter, Hirji Kanji Patel, this would be equivalent to the Pentium 4 technology but will be ultra low on voltage. The company also plans to start 20 level 3 multi-brand chip-level laptop service centres across India by April 2008.
Communications Minister A Raja has made it clear to bureaucrats in his ministry that there is no question of any change in the entry fee to be paid by a company for getting a unified access service licence, which allows an operator to offer mobile and fixed line services. In an unusually strong hand-written noting (not the first time that the 42-year old lawyer turned politician has done so) on a file relating to licences and related issues, Raja castigated senior officials.
A study by economic think-tank Icrier (Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations) has found that any adverse impact of organised retail on mom-and-pop stores will wear off over a period of time. Organised retail, it has said, will not lead to job losses and will, in fact, raise farmers' earnings.
Many new players have challenged the offer by Bharti Airtel to pay Rs 2,650 crore (Rs 26.50 billion) to get a start-up GSM spectrum of 4.4 MHz. While some say they will up the ante and are planning to write to the government that they can offer more, others say the offer is meant to keep away new competitors.
The company is also looking at recruiting employees from outside India, especially for services and expertise that people in India lack.
Chevron Corporation, one of the world's largest global energy companies, may pull out of Reliance Petroleum (RPL) by selling its 5 per cent equity to Reliance Industries.
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