rediffGURU Vivek Lala answers your income tax and personal finance queries.
BPCL is a high revenue-earning public-sector undertaking (PSU) and plans to privatise it are completely off the table, Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Hardeep Singh Puri said on Tuesday after assuming charge of the ministry for the second time. "Why would we divest ourselves of highly successful Maharatnas like BPCL," Puri said, arguing the Centre was not in favour of divesting its stake in oil PSUs.
The NINL management can see this as their moment of giving back to the nation and humanity. Its plant has an oxygen unit that can produce 418 tonnes of oxygen every day. 418 tonnes is about 58% of Delhi's daily demand for oxygen, notes Sudhir Bisht.
INS Imphal is the first warship to have been named after a city from the northeast, said Vice Admiral Dinesh K Tripathi, Flag Officer Commanding in Chief, Western Naval Command.
Finance Minister P Chidambaram is slated to meet bankers on November 18, to review performance of PSU banks and discuss ways of augmenting their capital by Rs 60,000 crore (Rs 600 billion) in the next 5-6 years.
After the finance minister directed public sector banks to join the account aggregator (AA) ecosystem, 5-6 major ones, including State Bank of India (SBI) and Bank of Baroda are expected to go live by July-end. Sahmati, an industry alliance for the AA ecosystem, has been working with PSU banks to get them onboarded for quite some time now. So far, Union Bank of India and Punjab National Bank (PNB) have gone live on the AA ecosystem. While Union Bank has been live for a while, PNB went live earlier this month.
Chidambaram met petroleum secretary R S Pandey on Sunday morning to keep himself posted about the issues regarding the indefinite strike call given by oil PSU executives from January 7, sources said. Sources said Chidambaram told Pandey that the group may need three to four meetings to form its view and the first in the series has been scheduled for January 7 evening.
The Department of Disinvestment, which is the nodal department for carrying out PSU stake sale, will finalise the cabinet note after appointment of asset management companies to handle PSU ETF.
The government on Wednesday ruled out privatisation of PSU banks but asked them to focus on convergence and opt for mergers and acquisitions to become globally competitive.
PSU bank stocks are witnessing hectic activity these days and are now among the top traded stocks on the bourses.
Even as concerns over PSU Banks' asset quality and growth rates remain, there are few that offer a favourable risk-reward equation.
Power Grid Corporation (PGCIL) intends to ramp up its capex substantially through the next two financial years. The Public Sector Undertaking (PSU) utility posted flat consolidated revenues of Rs 10,700 crore in the third quarter of the current financial year (Q3FY24) and reported 7 per cent year on year (Y-o-Y) growth in net profit to Rs 4,000 crore. The Q3FY24 capex stood at Rs 3,440 crore and capitalisation at Rs 1,780 crore, taking the 9MFY24 total to Rs 8,700 crore capex and Rs 5,800 crore capitalisation, respectively.
The idea is to do away with the need for the approval of the Core Group of Secretaries on Divestment for privatisation of companies, especially in non-strategic sectors.
This is the first tranche of capital infusion for the fiscal and more funds would be provided in future depending upon the performance of PSU banks.
P V Subramanyam clears some misconceptions about debt funds.
The central government is looking to strengthen the boards of public sector banks (PSBs) by specifying terms of office and conditions of service for whole-time directors, and also seeking disclosures from all directors about interests in other companies. Through the Banking Laws Amendment Bill, the government is likely to introduce conditions for disqualification of whole-time and independent directors which are not specified in the current legislation. The Centre is seeking to introduce fresh changes that are aimed at strengthening the boards of PSBs, and holding their directors accountable, an official said.
The four public sector general insurance companies -- New India Assurance, United India Insurance, Oriental Insurance, and National Insurance Company -- have lost 800 basis points (bps) in market share in last five years to their private counterparts, the data from the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (Irdai) revealed. In 2018-19, the four had a cumulative market share of 40.04 per cent, with New India Assurance having a market share of 14 per cent and United India Insurance with a market share of 9.63 per cent. But, gradually in the past five years, these state-backed firms have lost their market share to private sector players, due to the declining health of their business.
A high-level committee on oil PSU recast has advised against merger of any state-run firms and recommended a national shareholding trust to hold government stake in them.
If the status is approved for ITI, it will get preference in the supply of technology products required by the defence services.
Analysts say there is still no visibility of earnings improvement.
There are four public sector general insurance companies.
The top 100 companies have accounted for 63% of the gains (Rs 51 trillion out of Rs 81 trillion), while firms beyond the top 100 have contributed 37 per cent (Rs 30 trillion).
The share of listed public sector undertakings (PSUs) in the overall market capitalisation has hit a three-year high of 11.4 per cent. This comes on the back of the sharp outperformance of the PSU pack over the past two years. In 2021 and 2022, the BSE PSU index gained 41 per cent and 23 per cent, respectively. Market participants said a combination of factors like value buying and bullishness, particularly in public sector banks (PSBs), were the reason for the improved prospects.
The second central public sector units (PSU) pay revision committee report has suggested a new classification of state-owned companies linking salaries and remuneration to productivity and performance.
The new government that presents the full Budget for 2024-2025 in July should be ready to restructure the way divestment is managed and implemented, proposes A K Bhattacharya.
Aizawl has been cut off from the rest of the country due to a landslide on National Highway 6 at Hunthar.
The government has now made it "practically impossible" for political appointees to find a place on the boards of the public sector units (PSUs) as independent directors (IDs), a top official said.
Its 11MFY24 production is around 40.2 mt. In FY25, it could hit 50 mt and it may reach 55 mt by FY26. The PSU has capex plans for multiple projects, which should improve the product mix and augment capacity to 100 mt for FY30.
The decision assumes significance following the enthusiastic response from retail investors in the Friday's stake sale in steel major SAIL, which fetched the government Rs 1,715 crore (Rs 17.15 billion).
Five state-run general insurance companies have a total exposure of Rs 347.64 crore, or 0.14 per cent of their total assets under management (AUM), in Adani group of companies, the finance ministry said on Monday. In a written reply to a question by Congress' Manish Tewari, Minister of State for Finance Bhagwat Karad said Life Insurance Corp (LIC) held Rs 35,917.31 crore in debt and equity of Adani group of companies as on December 31, 2022. This is 0.97 per cent of its total assets under management (AUM) of Rs 41.66 trillion.
The two anti-submarine warfare shallow watercraft built by Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers Limited were launched by Neeta Chaudhari, wife of Chief of Air Staff of Indian Air Force, Air Chief Marshal V R Chaudhari.
Indian stock markets are expected to be driven mostly by global factors this week amid a lack of local triggers and earnings season largely coming to an end, say analysts. Crude oil prices, rupee movement and US Federal Reserve meeting minutes to be released this week will also influence the market sentiment. "With the earnings season behind us, global cues would largely dictate the trend in the coming week," Ajit Mishra, SVP - technical research, Religare Broking Ltd, said.
In the past 10 trading sessions, shares of the state-owned company have shot up more than 50 per cent.
The overall debt servicing metrics of Indian corporates are weak.
The devotion to the deity is such that even commerce is not untouched by the spiritual feel in the holy city. Images of the grand temple is finding places even on visiting cards, posters, calendars and even signages.
In the last two months, these stocks have lost nearly a quarter of their market cap.
At present, to be eligible for the job of chairman, a person from within the company should not be even a day older than 58 years.
Stocks of government probables for divestment or stake sale such as Steel Authority of India (SAIL), Mahanagar Telephone Nigam (MTNL), National Aluminium Company (Nalco) and Container Corporation (Concor) have outperformed the markets in the past one year.
Calling a ministerial group formed to look into their wage demands an eyewash, PSU oil firm executives today said they will go on indefinite strike from January 7, as the government has failed to live up to its promises of giving officers a fair deal.
Sensex has six while Nifty has only 10.
