In Gujarat, of the 12.5 million hectare of area under cultivation, while six million is dependent on rainfall, two million is covered by groundwater, a bulk of which is said to be in north Gujarat. Scanty rainfall in the last one and half years has not only depleted groundwater level but also affected dams.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday announced Rs 3 lakh crore collateral free automatic loan for businesses, including MSMEs, to benefit 45 lakh small businesses. Detailing parts of the Rs 20 lakh crore economic stimulus package, she said this loan will have a 4-year tenure and will have 12-month moratorium, she said.
"In terms of local taxes, in terms of local small business productivity, local large business competitiveness, their educational outcomes, their entrepreneurial work, that's what matters," the Microsoft CEO said.
Schools were ordered shut, flights suspended and the stock market was closed down in the United Arab Emirates as rare heavy rain hit the desert Gulf state.
The company's market valuation stood at Rs 10,972 crore in morning trade.
'I have no problems with the finance ministry or with state governments treating petrol pump prices as the last resort for meeting their ambitious spending targets with very limited revenue resources.' 'But let's do away with this smokescreen of free pricing of petrol and diesel and go back to administered pricing regime,' says Dr Sudhir Bisht.
Currently, banks follow system of internal benchmarks, including Prime Lending Rate, Benchmark Prime Lending Rate, Base rate and Marginal Cost of Funds based Lending Rate.
The RBI panel has also recommended a government-sponsored 'fund of funds' of Rs 10,000 crore to support the venture capital and private equity firms investing in the MSME sector.
The Indian Premier League's new franchise Rendezvous Sports World (RSW) has threatened to sue IPL commissioner Lalit Modi for breaking the confidentiality terms.
The two entities' combined distribution network would comprise 4,182 banking outlets and 476 ATMs across 34 states and Union territories of India, with more than 31,000 employees serving about 15 million customers across the country.
'Dear PM, INC supports the salary cut for MPs. Please note that MPLAD is meant to execute developmental works in the constituency. Suspending it is a huge disservice to the constituents and will undermine the role and functions of MP,' Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said on Twitter.
SKS Microfinance, one of the country's leading microfinance companies, has extended life insurance cover to about one million poor women in India in states such as Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, Karnataka, West Bengal, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh.
Modi said his government was committed to provide equal opportunities to all sections of the society.
The budget for the 'Shiv Smarak' has risen 35 times since it was first conceived.
The expectation that Mr Modi would be a major reformer, capable of reinvigorating the Indian economy, were based on a complete misreading of both his actions and his performance as Gujarat chief minister, says Mihir S Sharma.
The mega campaign, to start on Mahatma Gandhi's birth anniversary, will be conducted just before the elections in three major Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled states and also before the 2019 general elections.
Within 24 hours of the announcement of poll dates, traction on poll-based apps has risen drastically, report Karan Choudhury and Neha Alawadhi.
Tharoor has nearly 175,000 followers on Twitter. An account that he started when he launched his election campaign now may now cost him dear as voices urging him to log off Twitter keep getting louder by the day.
Perhaps chastised by the recent criticism from his party high command and the general public, Minister of State for External Affairs Shashi Tharoor has apologised for his recent comment that he was prepared to travel in the "cattle class out of solidarity with all our holy cows".
The NDA government will be following the footsteps of its predecessor, the UPA, which had introduced the concept of "loan mela" to boost credit by directing banks to lend to people through public meetings.
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Single-brand retailers are also allowed to take e-commerce route for such trading.
'I put forward a few legitimate questions. I didn't expect so much chaos just because I used a word which starts with 'V'.'
"The Securities and Exchange Board of India is working on the concept paper on SME exchanges. It may soon release the guidelines," Minister of State for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Dinsha Patel said at a seminar jointly organised by MCX-SX and the Society for Capital Market Research and Development in New Delhi on Tuesday.
Himachal has a tradition of change in government after every elections and going by the trend, this time it is the turn of the BJP which is upbeat after exit poll results.
'The solution is to enable a graceful transfer of the deposit and funding 'franchise' from capital-deficient firms to capital-surplus firms.' 'This will expand credit intermediation, bring down its costs, and put the financial sector on a definite path of recovery,' argues former RBI deputy governor Viral Acharya.
'Demand apology from the Congress Party for insulting the people of India's North East & Tribals'
The government on Tuesday extended the deadline for filing income tax and GST returns, raised the threshold of default that could trigger insolvency of a company, and waived charges on cash withdrawals from ATMs of other banks as a precursor to a broader stimulus package for the economy distressed by the coronavirus outbreak.
If banks cannot charge interest from borrowers during the moratorium, who will bear that cost? Should the depositors subsidise the borrowers by foregoing interest on deposits? In that case, we will turn banking on its head! notes Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
The Survey says that present skilled workforce in India is only 2%.
Hundreds of RSS cadres are helping the Saffron party counter Lalu-Nitish's campaign on the reservation issue in Bihar polls, observes M I Khan
From scanning hospital entrants to disinfecting hospital areas and floors, robots are being roped in for tasks considered high-risk, says Peerzada Abrar.
SBI might present the first result for the combined entity at the end of the first quarter of 2017-18
Several Union ministers and chief ministers voluntarily removed the red beacons from their vehicles even before the notification of it came into effect.
Ayan Pramanik reports on former Infosys CFO V Balakrishnan's fintech firm, which aims to make borrowing easy for small firms and individuals.
According to the Chief Minister, Pallikal will receive a government 'high cash incentive' of Rs 60 lakh for winning two silver medals, while Chinnappa and Ghosal will get Rs 30 lakh each for their respective single silver medals.
As the deadlock over government formation in Jammu and Kashmir continued, the state unit of Congress on Thursday backed Peoples Democratic Party patron Mufti Mohammad Sayeed to lead the new dispensation to respect the people's verdict in the just-concluded assembly elections.
Bringing in the untapped informal sector into the formal one will benefit business.
Reserve Bank of India Governor Shaktikanta Das on Friday said the central bank will ensure adequate liquidity in the system to ease the financial stress caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. The central bank reduced the reverse repo rate -- the rate at which banks park their fund with the central bank -- by 25 basis points to 3.75 per cent.
What connects P S Jayakumar of Bank of Baroda, V Vaidyanathan of Capital First Ltd and Chandra Shekhar Ghosh of Bandhan?
UTI, SBI, Reliance MF promote SIPs with low threshold. However, there are several hurdles. Mutual fund investments require the investor to have a PAN -- a big deterrent when it comes to tapping small and marginal investors. A big fear is that given the fickle nature of the stock market, rural investors might easily get scared when there is a downturn in the market.
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