The development took place irrespective of the recent escalation in tension and war of words between India and Pakistan. The matter has been referred to the external affairs ministry which is learnt to be favourably disposed towards it. Once it gets South Block's go-ahead, DMRC will send a team of its officials to Karachi to prepare a detailed project report. DMRC Managing Director Elattuvalapil Sreedharan said this will include all aspects of the project.
Global railway companies have emerged the top contenders on technical parameters for the country's first railway station modernisation and operation project in New Delhi, the first of private-public partnership schemes.
The Planning Commission has recommended that the private company in 50:50 joint sector infrastructure projects should be selected through competitive bidding.
Each logistics park will have a container terminal for both domestic and international operations, mineral-handling terminals, cement and fertiliser terminals, automobile terminals, storage and distribution as well as trans shipment facilities, conventional, cold storage and product-specific warehouses as well as hotels, banks, food parks and entertainment centres. Logistics companies said the multi-modal logistics parks offer a huge growth opportunity.
We will not be in the ultra-low-cost car segment. Our focus will be on the A1 and A2 segments, which are growth areas in which many of the new players like Nissan, Volkswagen or Toyota are planning to enter. Our entry-level car will remain the Maruti 800.
With 3G mobile services, which provide high-speed downloads of data, movies and videos, around six month away, mobile phone makers are getting ready to offer handsets for as little as Rs 3,500, against the currently available minimum price of over Rs 8,000.
However, portability services, which were earlier expected to be launched by the end of the year in the four metros -- Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai -- as well as Tamil Nadu, have now been delayed till February or March 2009 (the DoT has said that it will start operations six months after the licence is granted).
Passenger car prices could increase by Rs 10,000 to Rs 15,000 if Parliament approves a transport ministry proposal to amend the Motor Vehicles Act to extend the use of speed governors, currently restricted to commercial vehicles, to all vehicles.
DoT identifies more spectrum, to expand auctions from earlier estimate of five in each service area.
This follows the show-cause notice that was issued to the company last month by the ministry of informaton and broadcasting and the response given by the company. According to highly placed sources, the letter of suspension of Bharti's DTH licence has been moved within the I&B ministry because it is not satisfied with the response sent by Bharti Telemedia.
The department of telecommunications has raised questions about the merger between Idea Cellular and Spice Telecom violating key clauses on intra-circle merger and mobile licence conditions.
The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has mooted a proposal under which operators will pay a one-time fee for all spectrum allotments beyond 6.2 MHz.
The Department of Telecommunications is examining a proposal to auction around nine licences for 3G -- or third generation -- services among incumbents and new players in place of an earlier proposal to allow five players in this space.
As all airlines have raised carriage charges, private couriers have increased their tariffs 8-20 per cent. India Post, on the other hand, has not tinkered with its tariffs at all. As a result, India Post's tariff is 70 per cent cheaper for domestic destinations and 30 per cent cheaper for international destinations.
The MTN-Reliance Communications merger, if it gets through, will create a telecom behemoth of 115 million subscribers in 25 countries.
Domestic airlines will save around Rs 2,500 crore annually if they import aviation turbine fuel directly rather than buy it from state-owned oil marketing companies. This would help them shave off around 14 per cent of their burgeoning fuel bill and cut the industry's projected loss of Rs 8,000 crore for the current financial year by a little less than a third.
A no-holds-barred boardroom battle has broken out between Mahendra Nahata and the Dhoots of Videocon, 36:64 partners in Datacom Solutions, a company which wants to launch mobile telephone services all over the country in a month-and-a-half.
A high-profile team from MTN is also expected to meet Reliance Industries Ltd next week to take stock of the situation. RCom had informed the bourses on May 26 that it has entered into exclusive negotiations with MTN for 45 days soon after the South African giant aborted its talks with the Sunil Mittal-controlled Bharti group. The deadline will end on July 8.
The tour packages started by IRCTC include rail and road travel, hotel accommodation, meals and sightseeing.
In order to increase its payload capacity and save fuel, the railways are considering a proposal to procure aluminium wagons by 2012-13, when the dedicated freight corridor is scheduled to become operational. The final decision would be taken after a cost-benefit study, said senior railway ministry officials. Aluminium wagons will be costlier than the steel and stainless steel wagons that are in use currently.