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| Hot issues of Today |
- Apr 11, 2007
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| Apr 12, 2007 |
Hydel power to light up rural Jharkhand
JAMSHEDPUR, APR 12: Jharkhand, endowed with a good number of rivers, rivulets and waterfalls, has identified 47 locations in the state where hydel projects of various sizes could come up for producing around 64 mw to bring relief to people living in its remote villages. Initially, it is to start work on 25 such sites. The Jharkhand Renewable Energy Development Agency (Jreda) has already floated national tenders for erection/construction of hydel projects at these 25 locations. The bids close on May 8. While the power projects will be of various generating capacities, from 0.2mw to 6.86 mw, they will together have the potential to generate around 33 mw in five-six years. The entire project is to cost around Rs 165 crore. According to Jreda director SEH Kazmi, Mecon, which has been appointed as technical consultant, will, after evaluating the techno-commercial viability of the projects as submitted by the bidders, forward them to Jreda's purchase committee for a decision. Some of the 25 sites are located at Kolebera, Banu, Tethainagar (Simdega district); Mahuabaand, Sugabaand & Pidhe (Latehar district); Disham Falls, Subarnarekha at Namkum, Raru, Tajna river at Arki, Topra, Subarnarekha at Hudroo & Jouha (Ranchi district); Subarnarekha at Kuju, Kharkai, Subarnarekha III & IV (East Singhbhum); Chainpur, Bistanpur and Dumri (Gumla district), etc. The selected parties will conduct a detailed survey investigation (DSI) and prepare detailed project reports (DPRs) after examining all natural conditions at the sites.
"No power is expected to be generated for at least four years from the date contracts for preparation of DSI/DPRs are given," Kazmi told FE over phone. Jreda has filed a counter affidavit in the Jharkhand high court, pleading that the eight hydel projects, at Tenu-Bokaro (1 mw), Chandil (8 mw), Manlab (24 mw), Sadni (1 mw), Lower Ghagra ( 0.4 mw), Netarhat (0.5 mw), Nindigha (0.2 mw) and Zalimgha (0.2 mw), which have been under Bihar Hydroelectric Power Corporation (BHPC) for some time, be handed over to it now.
BHPC said that as it has already gone ahead with some of the projects, it should be allowed to complete them. Jreda sources, however, have challenged BHPC, saying the corporation's claim of 'major work having been done' is not true.
http://www.financialexpress.com/fe_full_story.php?content_id=160950
Jharkhand death trail...
RANCHI, April 11: A disaster is waiting to happen. An assessment has been done by the National Highway Wing of Road Construction of the national highways passing through Jharkhand, besides the bridges and culverts on these roadways.
The condition of at least 60 bridges on national highways that run through most districts have been labelled "extremely dangerous, needing immediate repairs or replacement".
There are nearly 100 bridges in the state, all on busy highways. These are more than 100 years old and need immediate attention. The condition of a considerable stretch of the national highways in Jharkhand is also bad, in the absence of timely maintenance, the assessment has indicated.
NHWRC officials say the situation is grim.
"There are about 400 small bridges in Jharkhand, either 30 metres in length or less, and another 200 major bridges on 1,844 km of national highway. At least 192 km of this stretch is part of the Golden Quadrilateral project. The bridges on the remaining 1,652 km of national highway have to be repaired immediately.
Many of the bridges have missing or broken railings. Patch work has been done on many of them as an ad hoc measure, leaving them even more vulnerable to wear and tear. Load-bearing structures and girders under the bridges have cracked in many cases, but heavily loaded vehicles continue to ply on them, an NHWRC official said.
With new guidelines coming into force, repair and maintenance of national highways are now the responsibility of the states through which they pass. The respective state governments send to Delhi their proposals for construction of bridges, repair and maintenance of existing bridges and highways. The Union government allocates funds in the budget and scrutinises their proposals. The 105-km NH 23, near Simdega, is the Halbai Bridge. "The steel-girder bridge is a key link to the border district. It collapsed last year. Some hamhanded work has been done and the structure reopened to traffic. The same happened with the Hirni Bridge on NH 75 (extension). The bridge caved in during monsoon last year but has been opened after some quick repairs. The Garg Bridge's condition on the Chas-Ramgarh stretch of NH 23 and the four bridges, including the important Pandra Bridge on NH 75 connecting Ranchi to Daltonganj, going to Nagar Utariand and onwards to Uttar Pradesh, are also in bad shape," the official said. The NHWRC chief engineer, Mr Harinath Chattopadhyay, is aware of the serious condition of the bridges and national highways in Jharkhand.
"The NHWRC was recently given the task of repairing and maintaining NH 75 from Ranchi to Orissa via Khunti, Murhu, Bandgaon, Chakradharpur, Chaibasa, Hatgamharia and Jaidga by the state government. We have found that 200 km of the total 2003-km stretch, is in a terrible condition. There are nearly 400 major and minor bridges on the stretch. We have sent a project report and proposal to the Union government and are waiting for their clearance and financial sanctions," Mr Chattopadhyay said.
http://www.thestatesman.net/page.news.php?clid=2&theme=&usrsess=1&id=153114
Easterly breeze
Much water has flown down the Ganges ever since the realty market heated up in the northern plains. Now check the spillover — strong demand drivers underlying commercial and retail markets have ensured an exponential growth in real estate demand across major markets in eastern India.
Undeniably, the bridge is too far and wide as compared to other states and the eastern markets still command comparatively low value levels. But the high growth curve seen over the last two-three years can't be missed either. Already, experts say that the growth curve of West Bengal and, to an extent, Orissa and Jharkhand will be very high. And it is expected that real estate demand in these places will also rise to match the growth in supply which is being created or is in the pipeline.
Some concerns, however, persist over a price correction of 15-20% in the residential sector across major metros and its fallout in the eastern markets. Says Abhijit Das, regional director, Trammell Crow Meghraj, a real estate consultant company: "Markets in West Bengal and rest of East might see stagnation and comparatively lower growth in price levels for a very short period, but there's no correction. In the medium to long term, these markets will witness significant and consistent growth in real estate prices and volumes. In fact, the growth curve might be one of the highest in the country."
Sumit Dabriwala, MD, Hiland Group, feels the realty prices have remained fairly stable in the East over the last few years. They have grown but have not recorded the quantum jumps witnessed in the other regions of the country. Prices in this part of the country have only reflected the increase in construction costs and land prices, he points out.
Prices have indeed held the line so far. But this may be the turning point. In fact, Dabriwala says, West Bengal and other neighbouring states are poised to witness significant growth on account of industrial and services investments that are coming into the region.
These are expected to keep the outlook for the real estate sector buoyant in the medium term. The rise in interest rates is temporary and will, in any case, impact investment purchases more than actual user demand because the region has always been driven more by actual users than by investors. "I would expect the interest rates to begin to settle to more realistic levels by September 2007," he reasons.
Ambuja Realty Group chairman Harshavardhan Neotia is also optimistic. "As far as Kolkata is concerned, real estate prices will remain stable in the near future. Demand for both commercial as well as residential properties will continue to rise. However, since the supply is currently much higher than the actual demand, some of the projects which are not well conceived or planned may face difficulties in the near future."
Dabriwala, however, feels that while some other cities in the country may be headed for a supply overhang, the eastern region is still delivering a fairly modest amount of real estate in each of the categories. "Therefore, I see no concern whatsoever for well-formatted developments from reputed real estate developers," he adds
"We are seeing a stabilisation of select markets in the current real estate scene. A consistent upswing is not possible in any market, particularly when a large level of supply is in the offering. Real estate markets have observed high levels of growth in the recent past. However, in certain markets, market stabilisation has been observed. This indicates that there are not many buyers for the prices quoted for various real estate typologies at this point of time," says Sanjay Chandra, MD, Unitech group.
On the broad level, elaborates Das, while growth in the real estate sector over the last five-seven years has been backed by robust underlying fundamentals and economic growth, growth in real estate investment and prices can be attributed to easy availability of leveraged and non-leveraged funds and inflow of private equity or foreign direct investment into the market. "Policy maker's efforts to correct this overflow of funds inflow by making primary and secondary fundings more costly will keep the heat under control, while not impacting growth levels," he observes.
That's a complex interplay of market forces. But experts also feel that an inhibiting factor in the growth of retail malls business could be the lack of sufficient infrastructure to cope with growing mall developments. Even in a developed market such as Delhi, they argue, the infrastructure is not strong and well planned to deal with added pressures to be put by the coming malls.
Dr Devinder Gupta, CMD, DGS Realtors, says that in the case of large destination developments, a serious pressure on the infrastructure (specially traffic and parking) is expected and the planning authorities need to take cognizance of this. The city and the government have to keep pace with the developments and they are doing a good job. It just has to be done faster. In fact, all this developments will rather help in developing the area it is located in. Instead of witnessing disorganised growth it retail, it will promote planned development with proper facilities, he adds.Well, that's the tale so far. Now much of the unfolding action will depend on retail.
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Magazines/The_Sunday_ET/Property/Easterly
_breeze/articleshow/msid-1775335,curpg-2.cms
Cabinet flags off big-ticket road projects worth Rs 8,900 crore
NEW DELHI, APR 12: The cabinet committee on economic affairs (CCEA) on Thursday cleared a host of road projects, estimated to cost Rs 8,900 crore. The projects include four-laning of national highways in Bihar, Jharkhand, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh on build-operate-transfer (BOT) basis.
The four-laning of 780 km of national highway in Bihar is expected to cost Rs 6,782 crore. The projects in the other three states will cost Rs 1,616 crore.
The CCEA also gave its nod to the Rs 557-crore project for providing four-lane connectivity to the proposed international container transhipment terminal (ICTT) at Vallarpadam in Kochi, Kerala using cess funds.
The project will be implemented by the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) and is to be completed within 30 months commencing April 2007.
The meeting also approved further expansion of National Highways and Development Programme-III, under implementation since 2005, to include upgrade of 996 km of road stretches.
Of the total 12,109 km of roads under NHDP-III, 7,294 km will be upgraded on BOT basis at an estimated cost of Rs 47,557 crore. An amount of Rs 29,869 crore will be borne by the private sector and the government will fund Rs 17,688 crore.
As per the decision taken by the CCEA, the private sector will bear Rs 29,869 crore and the government will pump in Rs 17,688 crore.
Inclusion of the 780 km of NH in Bihar is over and above the approved length of 4035 km under NHDP Phase-IIIA. The proposal will now go for clearance to the PPPAC. With this inclusion, total length of National Highways to be upgraded under NHDP Phase III would be 4815 km.
The estimated cost of Rs 6,782 crore will include the cost for land acquisition, utility shifting, rehabilitation and resettlement, consultancy, within the ceiling of 40% of viability gap funding (grant) in accordance with implementation mechanism.
As some of the sections, such as Mokama-Muker Section of NH-80, Muzzafarpur-Sonbarsa Section of NH-77, Motihari-Raxaul Section of NH-28A and Forbesgenj-Jogbani Section of NH-57A approved to be taken up on BOT basis (which will be tolled later) have very low traffic volume and the maintenance cost can be higher than the toll collected in these sections, it is likely that there will be no response to bids for BOT (Toll) projects.
Keeping this in view, CCEA gave approval to take up these sections on BOT (Annuity) mode without any further clearance from CCEA, if no response to the bids on BOT (Toll) is received, after at least two advertisements.
The projects include four-laning of national highways in Bihar, Jharkhand, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh on BOT basis
• The CCEA also gave its nod to the project for providing four-lane connectivity to the proposed ICTT at Vallarpadam in Kochi, Kerala using cess funds
http://www.financialexpress.com/fe_full_story.php?content_id=160946
MF collections up 25 per cent in Orissa
The mutual fund investment in Orissa is estimated at over Rs 400 crore.
This has gone up appreciably by about 25 per cent 325 crore during last year. This achievement is particularly noteworthy because of the fact that Orissa does not have many large corporate who are known to invest huge amounts in mutual fund instruments.
The mutual market in the state is mainly driven by the small and retail investors, mostly comprising the salaried class who are attracted to the sector for availing tax saving benefits.
However, despite this growth Orissa's share in the national mutual fund pie is very small.
The total assets managed by the mutual fund industry in the country is estimated at over Rs. 3 lakh crore.
The mutual fund industry is experiencing phenomenal growth over last few years because of buoyant stock market, says Raghvendra Nath, Head - strategy and business development of Birla Sun Life Mutual Fund.
Nath, who was here to launch the company's Birla Sun Life Long Term Advantage Fund -series 1 (BSLAF-series 1) said, though equity market has given fabulous return to the investors over last 3-4 years, they have to change their investment portfolio judiciously if they want the same rate of return to continue in future.
As the stock market movement during last 3-4 years was based upon strong fundamentals and there is a lot of interest among the Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs), the market is likely to be bullish.
The investment in small and midcap companies has given good return to the investors and the trend likely to continue, he added. He said, the asset under management of Birla Mutual Fund has increased from Rs. 3500 crore five years back to Rs.20, 000 crore at present.
Nath said, Birla Sun Life Mutual Fund has no immediate plan to start any offshore fund.
"Though there have been deliberations on it, no final decision has been taken so far".
Birla Mutual Fund has launched BSLAF-series 1. It is a three year closed end equity fund which aims to provide long term capital appreciation.
Upon maturity, the scheme will automatically be converted into an open-ended scheme.
The resources mobilised through this fund will be mainly invested in a portfolio of attractively priced small and mid cap stocks expected to post attractive growth in next few years.
http://www.business-standard.com/smartinvestor/storypage.php?leftnm=0&subLeft
=9&chklogin=N&autono=280946&tab=r
Orissa villagers damage roads protesting steel plant
Hundreds of villagers, protesting the proposed steel plant by a South Korean firm in their area, Thursday damaged roads and set up barricades in this Orissa district to prevent the police or company officials from entering their villages.
'The villagers cut off roads at three places after the local administration deployed over 500 policemen in our locality,' said Abhaya Sahoo, a leader of a local organisation that opposes the proposed steel plant by South Korea's POSCO.
The roads linking Nuagaon, Dhinkia, Trilochanpur and Gobindapur villages were cut off by villagers, said Sahoo, who is the president of POSCO Pratirodh Sangram Samiti (PPSS).
POSCO, one of the world's biggest steel makers, signed a deal with the state government in June 2005 to set up a $12 billion plant near the port town of Paradeep by 2016. However, there has not been any significant progress on the project due to local opposition.
While the state government claimed that it deployed police personnel to bring normality in the area and to help the administration conduct local bodies election, villagers alleged it was an attempt by the local administration to acquire their farmland for industrial use.
Elections to local bodies were held in February across the state barring some villages in the region following clashes between supporters and protestors of the proposed steel plant.
According to Sahoo, hundreds of villagers are guarding some other roads to prevent policemen and government officials from entering the district.
'The villagers have also placed wooden gates at nine places to prevent the entry of any officials,' A. Panda, a local police official, said.
More than 20,000 people of about 15 nearby villages including Dhinkia, Gada Kujanga and Nuagaon have been opposing the project, fearing eviction. The villagers say the project will displace them and ruin their betel leaf farming.
POSCO, however, says although the plant would affect only 500 families it will create thousands of jobs
http://www.indiaprwire.com/businessnews/20070412/21916.htm
Nine foetuses found in drain in Bengal
COOCHBEHAR: Nine foetuses packed in plastic bags were found in a drain near the sub-divisional hospital in Tufangunj town of West Bengal's Coochbehar district on Wednesday.
District Magistrate Rajesh Kumar Sinha said the sex of the foetuses and their origin were yet to be ascertained.
The plastic packets were recovered when municipality workers were cleaning the drain at about 6.30 pm in Tufangunj, a sub-divisional town about 30 km from this district headquarter town of North Bengal.
An FIR was lodged in this regard with the Tufangunj police station.
Local people raised suspicion that the foetuses were dumped after illegal abortion. A senior district health official said no one would be spared if any health department personnel was found to be involved in the matter.
The Chief Medical Officer and The Additional Superintendent of Police have rushed to Tufangunj from here, the District Magistrate said.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/NEWS/India/Nine_foetuses_found_in_drain_in_Bengal
/articleshow/1895270.cms
High-tech sector eyes India's rural market
KOLKATA - The roads are dusty and unpaved; electricity is erratic and its quality inferior; the residents seldom finish school and to most the use of hi-technology starts with a television and ends with a mobile phone - just for talking. Yet ask the heads of dozens of technology companies in India and they will tell you that foremost on their list of strategic moves is to head into rural India.
From multinational high-tech consumer durable companies to Chinese mobile-phone makers; from global information
technology giants such as Microsoft to back-office service providers; global telecom and biotechnology companies, and even India's IT-sector lobbyist, the National Association of Software Services Companies (NASSCOM), are stepping out of the cities and moving into the villages and towns of rural India.
Each has different imperatives and objectives, but all say that the growing influence of rural India on the country's society and economy is too big to ignore. Over 740 million people - about 65% of India's population - live in some 600,000 villages and small towns, and according to a recent survey by Indian Revenue Service, more than half of the 145 million rural households in India earn between US$300 and $1,400 a year.
And although only estimates of the present size of the rural markets are available, according to a survey by the global advisory firm Mckinsey & Co, carried out in April last year, India's rural markets have the potential to reach $500 billion by 2020.
But that's old news. After all, the realization that rural India holds huge potential dawned on people about two decades back, when fast-moving consumer product companies - makers of toothpaste, soap, detergent, soft drinks, etc - moved in, first just to sell their products. But what's different in the "Rural Strategy Version 2" is the new range of interests and their approach in tapping this largely unexplored market. The latest rural aspirants include a wide range of companies, ranging from retail products to drug and industrial products companies, as well as many technology companies.
Their strategy, too, is different. Few are looking at selling their products or services immediately; in fact, many are willing to wait for years. In addition, almost all are targeting the entire rural population rather than just the affluent elite.
Take Yahoo for example, the latest firm to announce that it is moving into rural India. This Internet company has finally decided to take the plunge after watching the markets for several months, primarily because competition from rival portals is getting tougher. According to Pranesh Anthapur, chief operations officer of Yahoo India, "The importance of rural India can't be underestimated any more." The company plans - for the time being - to just promote brand awareness by providing basic e-commerce support against the backdrop of growing personal computer ownership and Internet penetration in rural India.
Yahoo's obvious competition in the rural markets is Google, which announced its foray about two weeks back and does not have profits in mind either - at least not just yet. This search-engine technology innovator's "challenge" is to make the search engine less complicated, as well as to develop content for rural users - such as weather updates, crop patterns, ebb and tide schedules, etc.
Similarly, DataWind Net Access Corp, a Canada-based provider of wireless web access products and services, has tied up with the Indian IT lobbyist NASSCOM to run Internet training programs in the villages and small towns in the Indian states of Orissa, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal and Maharashtra. The objective looks more social than commercial in the sense that the aim is to improve the reach and user base of the Internet in villages and small towns so that state and district administration services can be enhanced and made more transparent.
Rural India also drives volumes
But if the rural markets are not revenue generators yet for Yahoo!, Google or even Microsoft - which is implementing the "IT Saksham" project primarily to evangelize the benefits of using IT in rural communities - most telecom companies (and even mobile handset makers) are moving out of larger cities and plugging into the rural sector, purely to ramp up volumes.
Although urban markets are still lucrative and will continue to be the focus for the telecom sector, the untapped potential of the rural markets is now seen as the next volume driver. "India has the target of reaching 500 phone subscribers - from the present 200 million (fixed plus mobile) - by 2010, and that kind of growth can only come from the rural segment," said TV Ramachandran, director general, Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI).
In fact, a strange thing happened in India two weeks ago. To create and run networks in remote areas, the government announced the auction of 81 rural regions, the laying-out cost of which was supposed to have been subsidized by the Universal Service Obligation Fund (USOF) created by the Department of Telecom (DoT) in 2003. The resources for implementation of this objective are raised through a 5% universal service levy on gross revenue of all telecom companies (except the pure value-added service providers like the Internet, voicemail, e-mail service providers) and grants and loans from the federal government.
However, in 38 of the 81 regions, telecom companies did not bid - meaning that subsidies was not sought at all - and in about 15 regions, Bharti Airtel, Reliance Communications and Aircel (three of India's large telecom companies) submitted negative bids - which means that they preferred to pay into the USOF instead of accepting its support.
"Most of the rural pockets, which were unviable even a few years back, have now become viable and profitable. Therefore, operators preferred to pay to the USOF rather than to take its support and be bound by a few restrictive DoT conditions," said a COAI spokesperson.
Small wonder then that with the DoT stranded with unutilized USOF funds of about $2 billion as of March, many telecom experts have started questioning the utility of creating such a fund in the country.
Indeed, to some extent, thanks to an abysmally low teledensity (number of telephone connections per 100 people) of 4% (versus 15% in urban areas) in rural India, that segment of the market is scorching. According to the vision plan drawn up by the DoT, 200 million rural telephone connections are envisaged by the end of 2012, taking the rural teledensity figure to 25%.
New source for human resources
India's 700 million-plus rural population is a cheap talent pool as well. That's what the flourishing IT-enabled services or the business process outsourcing (BPO) sector has realized lately. Stymied in their growth by an acute shortage of human resources in the cities (where the attrition rate can go up to 60%) local BPO companies have now started moving into to the rural sector for launching their services. The other reason why the rural sector has emerged as attractive is cost. The industry says that the infrastructure cost is 20% cheaper compared to urban set-ups.
Pioneers that have set up such centers include Lason Inc (a US-based outsourcing firm), GramIT (a rural venture associated with local IT giant the Satyam Group), and Datamation (a Delhi-based group). These are now the key players in the Indian rural BPO scene, who say that besides reducing costs for their customers, their rural strategy has also been a key contributor toward bridging the digital divide and creating jobs.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/ID13Df06.html
Maoist outfits declared unlawful in Chhattisgarh
Raipur, Apr 12: The Chhattisgarh Government has declared Communist Party of India (Maoist) and its five frontal organisations ''unlawful''.
The Home department has issued a notification declaring these organisations as ''unlawful'' under section 3 of the Chhattisgarh Special Peoples' Security Act, 2006, for one year, official sources said today.
Besides CPI (Maoist), a naxalite organisation active in many districts of Chhattisgarh, five frontal organisations had also been brought under the provisions of the Act.
These organisations are the Dandakaranya Adivasi Kisan Mazdoor Sangh, the Krantikari Adivasi Mahila Sangh, the Krantikari Adivasi Balak Sangh, the Krisnikari Kisan Committee and the Mahila Mukti Morcha.
The Dr Raman Singh Government had brought the Chhattisgarh Special Peoples' Security Act, 2006, to contain unlawful activities in the state, particularly in the light of increased naxalite activities in tribal Bastar region.
http://www.newkerala.com/news.php?action=fullnews&id=17850
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| Hot issues of Today |
- Apr 11, 2007
- Apr 10, 2007
- Apr 09, 2007
- Apr 08, 2007
- Apr 07, 2007
- Apr 06, 2007
- Apr 05, 2007
- Apr 04, 2007
- Apr 03, 2007
- Apr 02, 2007
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