Parents of celebrity manager Disha Salian have written to President Ram Nath Kovind seeking action against Union Minister Narayan Rane, his MLA-son Nitesh and others for allegedly spreading fake news about their daughter's death and defaming the family.
After unveiling a range of relief measures - primarily targeting the MSME and business segment - on Wednesday, Sitharaman is expected to, in her second tranche of financial stimulus, focus on the poor and farm sector.
Banks will also consider requests from MSMEs for restructuring their stressed standard assets. So far, only 25 per cent of the around 1 million eligible MSMEs have taken benefit of the RBI's special dispensation.
Giving a relief to exporters community, the government on Thursday said it will release Rs 56,027 crore to exporters against pending tax refunds under different incentive schemes for outbound shipments. The amount will be disbursed to more than 45,000 exporters. Briefing the media about the decision, Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal said that the Rs 56,027 crore, which is being released under various export promotion schemes, is over and above duty remission of Rs 12,454 crore for the Remission of Duties and Taxes on Export Products (RoDTEP) Scheme and Rs 6,946 crore for Rebate of State and Central Levies and Taxes (RoSCTL) Scheme already announced.
Exporters on Thursday demanded fiscal incentives, tweaking in customs duties on certain products and credit at affordable rates in the forthcoming Budget to boost exports and create jobs. In a pre-budget virtual meeting with Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, the Federation of Indian Export Organisations (FIEO) said the depreciation of the rupee against the US dollar is affecting exports' competitiveness and the sector requires more support. "Creation of employment is the biggest challenge faced by the country...We would urge the government to provide fiscal support to units which provide additional employment in the export sector," the exporter's body said.
Asset quality of banks, which saw some improvement in the second half of 2020, is likely to worsen during the first six months of 2021, according to a survey. The findings are part of the 12th round of bankers' survey carried out by FICCI-IBA between July and December 2020. The survey was conducted on 20 banks, including public sector, private sector and foreign banks, representing about 59 per cent of the banking industry, as classified by asset size.
Gadkari said, infrastructure sector including highways, airports, inland waterways, railways, logistic parks, broad gauge and metro, apart from MSMEs can attract large scale foreign investment.
India's largest traders' association CAIT on Tuesday said few multinational e-commerce giants with a heavy arsenal of funding are attempting to flout foreign investment guidelines for the sector and demanded strict enforcement action. Releasing a whitepaper on the e-commerce policy, the Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) said e-commerce entities have "structured their relationship as marketplace with sellers in a such a way that they are in a position to control either seller on their platform or the inventory and also escape the scrutiny of the enforcement agencies." "Under the guise of such control or ownership over sellers, the issue also permeates from being a mere FDI policy violation to also being an anti-competitive conduct," it said.
Banks such as IndusInd Bank, Federal Bank, DCB Bank and Axis Bank which have renewed their focus on secured loans may be, hence, walking on a tightrope.
Banks have started refunding borrowers the compound interest charged on specified loan accounts during the moratorium period. Last week, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) had asked all lending institutions, including non-banking financial companies, to ensure that the scheme of waiver of interest on interest for loans up to Rs 2 crore for the six-month moratorium period is implemented by November 5.
Known for delivering time-bound results, Sharma earned Modi's confidence as his secretary during his tenure as the Gujarat chief minister by successfully handling the Vibrant Gujarat campaign to get investments to the state.
With retail inflation surprising on the upside, the six-member monetary policy committee (MPC) of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is expected to increase the repo rate by 35-50 basis points (bps) in the review scheduled for September 28-30. According to economists, the central bank will continue to focus on bringing inflation down even though economic growth has remained sluggish. Data released by the government on Monday showed that the consumer price index (CPI)-based inflation increased by 7 per cent year-on-year (YoY) in August, thus, staying above the upper tolerance limit of the central bank for all the eight months of 2022.
The party released its manifesto -- Samajwadi Vachan Patra -- for the coming assembly elections, shortly after the BJP released its own.
The government has notified a host of procedural changes in the GST rules, including levy of interest for wrongful utilisation of ITC and turnover threshold for filing annual returns for the 2021-22 fiscal. The changes were vetted by the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council at its meeting last week. With the amendments notified by the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC), businesses have also been allowed to make tax payments on the GSTN portal by using IMPS and UPI payment modes.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presents her fourth Budget in Lok Sabha on Tuesday.
Highlighting the role of MSMEs in enhancing exports and helping the country achieve self reliance, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari on Monday said India does not need to import from China. "Already in automobile sector, in many sectors now, in agriculture, automobiles, everywhere, we have already found the solutions. Now we don't need to import from China," said the minister. He observed that India was exporting a lot of items instead of importing them.
The minister said that the priority for him will be "rolling out all stuck highway projects that include many of the IL&FS projects within 100 days".
Every time someone gives you feedback, ask yourself: What can I learn from this feedback?
He said the SBI data showed that there is a rise in NPAs due to the coronavirus crisis but it is manageable as people have been cautious about increasing their liabilities especially in the retail, agriculture and MSME sectors.
The government on Tuesday extended till March 15 the deadline for corporate to file Income Tax returns for the fiscal ended March 2021. The deadline to file tax audit report and transfer pricing audit report for 2020-21 fiscal too has been extended till February 15. This is the third extension given to corporate for filing the income tax return for 2020-21 fiscal.
Raw material prices had been on the rise, but since Russia waged war on Ukraine, prices have surged.
'When a new superhero film releases, China creates figurines based on the film and puts them out in the market along with the film's release.' 'Does our domestic manufacturing sector been able to do it so quickly? No.' 'We have a large millennial population and we have to make products that are more in line with the tastes of those people.' 'The MSME sector can win back its customers only this way.' 'When they change with the consumers's needs, there will be a move towards Indian products.'
Only when we are part of the same family, which will happen down the line, then, of course, we will give them (PMC depositors) all the assurance and the comfort.'
The bamboo water bottle is priced at Rs 560 and the soap variant of 125 grams costs Rs 125 each.
Sources said the designers present in the meeting will submit their individual proposals shortly to the MSME ministry entailing suggestions to set up design centres.
'A change we have seen after the Russia-Ukraine war is the energy crisis in Europe.' 'Earlier, in Europe, people used to change their clothes after 5 washes, now they are using it till 15-20 washes.' 'They used to change their entire wardrobe after 2 months or so, but because of the economic conditions, it has changed.' 'It has affected exports as 40% of our exports is to Europe, 30% to the US and 10% to the UK.' 'The war has to end for better days to come.'
In his monthly Mann Ki Baat radio broadcast, Modi hailed the potential of India and said the basis of its strength is the country's farmers, artisans, weavers, engineers, small entrepreneurs, the MSME sector and people from many different professions."
'You have come out with a package for the kisan.' 'You have a package for industry.' 'But has anyone addressed the issues concerning small traders?'
'Our concern is about today and there is nothing in the Budget for the MSME sector to feel positive right now.'
A day after the Reserve Bank of India's (RBI's) Monetary Policy Committee hiked the policy repo rate by 50 basis points (bps), several commercial banks, including ICICI Bank and Bank of Baroda, raised their external benchmark-linked loan rates by an equal amount on Thursday. HDFC, the country's largest mortgage lender, too, increased its interest rates on housing loans by another 50 bps. In total, it has raised rates by 85 bps since May 4, when the RBI had increased the repo rate by 40 bps in an off-cycle meeting.
'Fear psychosis has gripped the entire world.' 'Nobody is going to enter shops freely in the next 5, 6 months.' 'Secondly, the priority has changed.' 'Now that they have seen the bottom of the economy, people will prefer to save for tomorrow.'
'You peel one layer, then another layer, then another, but in the end, you will see that there is no onion inside.' 'This package has been packaged well, but there is nothing much inside the package!'
The focus of the meeting will be on enabling businesses and households to avail of the revival framework on the basis of viability, necessary steps like finalising bank policies and identifying borrowers, and discussing issues that require addressing for smooth and speedy implementation.
'In times of recovery, we may see a rural-urban divide with the urban pockets affected more by COVID-19, but the MFI business model should encourage banks to handhold them in this hour of crisis,' notes Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
According to industry sources, domestic toy manufacturers are seeing a sharp rise in sales during the current financial year. On January 1, 2021, India had banned the sale of toys that are not certified by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS). This meant that all factories churning out toys to be sold in India had to be certified by the bureau along with mandatory product testing, including for units abroad.
Bandhan Bank is expecting that a little less than 50 per cent of its portfolio will be dominated by affordable housing loans in the next three to five years.
Unless controlled and contained, given the untested belief that the north Indian labour support and follow the Hindutva kind of political ideology, there is a potential in terms of ideological clashes with their Dravidian brethren in the local neighbourhoods, and it all escalating into violence, especially during election time, predicts N Sathiya Moorthy.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday pitched for front loading of capital expenditure, saying it is critical for revitalisting the economy post the coronavirus pandemic. During a virtual meeting with senior government officials to discuss the infrastructure roadmap ahead, she also asked ministries to aim to achieve more than their capital expenditure (capex) targets. The Union Budget 2021-22 provided a capital outlay of Rs.5.54 lakh crore, a sharp increase of 34.5 per cent over the Budget Estimate of 2020-21.
Five Star Business Finance is in the business of providing loans to MSME entrepreneurs. Gireesh Babu finds out more about the company that plans to grow to 3,000 crore by 2020.
Credit to priority sectors as well as small and medium industries will be discussed to find ways to accelerate economic growth.