The Hindu Business Line : Weekly News Round-up

The Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, on Thursday called for strengthening bodies such as the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank as also regional banks and regional arrangements so that the fallout of the global crisis is minimal on developing countries.

Stating that there was no danger of the financial crisis affecting the Bay of Bengal region countries, Dr Singh said that the message that he would be carrying for the G-20 meeting would be that the global grouping should do everything to ensure that the process of achieving the Millennium Goal is not adversely affected by the current global crisis.

Inflation dropped to its lowest levels in nearly six months in early November as price levels in the case of both metals and fuels showed a sharp decline.

The annual Wholesale Price Index-based inflation rate was at 8.98 per cent during the week ended November 1, sharply below the previous week's annual rise of 10.72 per cent.

The dip in the year-on-year inflation rate to a single digit level, after 21 consecutive weeks in the double digits, was on account of an all-round decline in price levels led by a drop in annual inflation in the fuels category.

The year-on-year rate of inflation in the fuels category sharply declined to 9.22 per cent during the latest reported week, compared to an inflation of 14.09 per cent reported in the previous week.

Japan's largest mobile operator NTT DoCoMo on Wednesday became the latest entrant in the growing mobile telephony market when it picked up a 26 per cent stake in the Tata Teleservices for a consideration of $2.7 billion or Rs 13,070 crore.

This deal would value TTSL, with its customer base of 30 million, at over $10 billion.

DoCoMo Inc later on Friday announced a Rs 949 crore open offer to the shareholders of Tata Teleservices for up to 20 per cent equity at Rs 24.70 per share.

A negative growth of 3.3 per cent in intermediate goods in September compared with 10 per cent in the corresponding period last year pulled down growth in the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) to 4.8 per cent in September 2008 as against 7 per cent in the same month last year.

In contrast, the capital goods sector grew by 18.8 per cent and the consumer durables increased by 13.1 per cent.

The manufacturing sector grew by 4.8 per cent during the month marking a substantial fall compared to 7.4 per cent registered in September last year.

Simultaneously, the growth in the electricity sector also decelerated marginally to 4.4 per cent as against 4.5 per cent recorded in the same month last year.

The Centre's excise duty revenues declined 8.7 per cent in October 2008 to Rs 9,399 crore compared with Rs 10,293 crore recorded in the same month last year.

The sluggish growth in industrial output could be an important factor behind the drop in excise duty collection.

This collection performance is in sharp contrast to the 14 per cent year-on-year growth registered in October last year.

Also, excise duty collections in September 2008 had declined on a year-on-year basis. Even sequentially, the excise duty collections in October 2008 were lower than the September 2008 collections of Rs 9,800 crore.

Larsen & Toubro and Malaysia-based Scomi Engineering Bhd will together build the country's first monorail system in Mumbai. The Rs 2,460-crore order for a 19.54-km stretch has been awarded to the consortium by the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority.

Even as the deadlock with the State Government over cane pricing continues, a couple of sugar mills in Uttar Pradesh have started crushing operations for the current 2008-09 season (October-September).

Factories in Uttar Pradesh were till now refraining from taking up crushing for the new season, following a dispute over the State Government fixing a price of Rs 140 a quintal for normal cane and Rs 145 a quintal for early maturing varieties. The State Advised Price (SAP) for 2007-08 was set at a lower Rs 125-130 range.

The industry had filed a writ petition against the new SAP at the Allahabad High Court.

Compiled and podcast by M.J. Madhavan