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By James Regan and Sharon Klyne, Aug 10, 2017 India's Adani Enterprises has appointed corporate finance firm Grant Samuel to advise on funding for its multi-billion dollar coal mine in the Australian outback, two sources with knowledge of the matter said on Thursday. Analysts have raised doubts about whether Adani can fund what would be Australia's biggest coal mine given opposition from green groups and volatile coal prices. Banks including Deutsche Bank and Commonwealth Bank of Australia have already said they will not provide funding. "Adani has mandated Grant Samuel to advise on the financing," one of the sources said. Both sources asked not to be identified as they were not authorised to speak with media. Grant Samuel declined to comment on whether it had been appointed to advise on funding for the Carmichael mine, which Adani had originally planned to develop at a cost of A$16.5 billion ($13 billion), before last year downsizing the first s...

PTI, Aug 9, 2017 The first phase of National Cyber Coordination Centre, set up to scan the country's web traffic to detect cyber security threats, has been made operational now, Parliament was informed today.  NCCC scans internet traffic coming into the country to detect real-time cyber threat and alert various organisations as well as internet service providers for timely action.  The government has also made operational botnet and malware cleaning centre that will detect malicious software in devices of citizens and clean them.  "The Government has proposed to set up National Cyber Coordination Centre (NCCC). Phase-I of NCCC has been made operational," Minister of State for Electronics and IT PP Chaudhary said in a reply to the Lok Sabha today.  "The Centre will scan the cyberspace in the country for cyber security threats at metadata level to generate situational awareness," he said.  NCCC, a multi-stakeholder body, will be implement...

By: Geeta Nair | Pune | Updated: August 10, 2017 The Pune Metro project being executed by Maha Metro is set to receive €245 million in funds from the French development bank AFD.  An AFD team led by Nicolas Fornage, regional director for South Asia, has visited the sites where work has begun. AFD has already funded `1,000 crore  for the Nagpur Metro Rail, another project being executed by Maha Metro. While this is a government-guaranteed loan, Fornage said they were open to fund projects in India without sovereign guarantees too. The Pune Metro is an `11,420-crore project which is being part-funded by the state and Central governments. Around €845 million for the project is to be raised from foreign funding agencies. While AFD will commit €245 million, the remaining €600 million will come from the European International Bank, said Brijesh Dixit, MD, Maha Metro. AFD and EIB will be appraising the project at the same time, Dixit added. Dixit said work has started o...

By: Prasanta Sahu and Saurabh Kumar | New Delhi | Updated: August 10, 2017 Taking India’s first bullet train closer to reality, work on the Mumbai-Ahmedabad project will commence soon, with the first tranche of $1 billion from a total loan of about $14 billion to be released during the visit of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to the country on September 12-14. The $17-billion high-speed railway line of 508 km, which will be built on Japan’s Shinkansen technology, is expected to be operational by 2022-23, India’s 75th year of independence. The initial agreement on the project was signed between India and Japan during Abe’s last visit to India in December 2015. The foundation ceremony of the project will be laid by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Abe near Ahmedabad on September 13, official sources said. Of the project cost of Rs 1,10,000 crore, Rs 88,000 crore will come from Japan as a 50-year soft loan at a benign interest rate of 0.1%. The amount to be repaid is just...

FE Bureau, Aug 10, 2017 With concerns being raised over sharing of data by technology and mobile companies with third party application developers without taking consent from the user, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) on Wednesday floated a consultation paper on privacy, security and ownership of data in the telecom sector. Releasing the consultation paper, the sector regulator said that focus is on “informational privacy, which forms a subset of the broader concept of privacy that encompasses many other philosophical, psychological, sociological, economic and political perspectives. In the context of data protection, it is also important to establish the ownership of the data”. Through this consultation, the regulator aims to identify key issues related to data protection in relation to the delivery of digital services, which includes provision of telecom and Internet services by telecom and Internet service providers as well as other devices, networks and ap...

Aug 9, 2017 A number of firms today approached the Securities and Appellate Tribunal (SAT) seeking a stay on the trading curbs imposed on them by Sebi amid reports that the capital market regulator may give relief to a dozen entities who are on the list of 331 that are suspected to be shell companies. The firms that approached the tribunal included Parsvanath Developers, J Kumar Infraprojects and Prakash Industries. The companies argued that Sebi's decision was arbitrary and that no detailed verification was done on the nature of their operations. Besides, the directive came without giving them a chance to explain. Observers do not rule out the possibility of more companies challenging the Sebi decision before the tribunal. The SAT is a statutory body established under the provisions of Section 15K of Sebi Act 1992 to hear appeals against the regulator. On Monday, Sebi had asked the bourses to place the shares of 331 firms under Stage VI of the "Graded Su...

PTI, Aug 9, 2017  Telecom operator Reliance Communications, which is reeling under debt of about Rs45,000 crore, plans to issue shares to lenders for the debt that it has raised from them, as per a regulatory filing of the company. The board of RCom is scheduled to meet on 12 August which will consider convening annual general meeting of shareholders to enable the firm seek their nod for converting debt into equity shares. In a regulatory filing, RCom said that the board will consider and approve matters related to merger scheme between the company and Aircel along with other deleveraging measures. The board will in the same meeting will consider “approving notice convening annual general meeting seeking shareholders’ enabling approval for various items including conversion of debt into equity shares, if and when required, for issue of privately placed non-convertible debentures/ other debt securities”. The RCom board will also consider update on the ongoing strategic...

Madhurima Nandy, Aug 10 2017  Canada’s Brookfield Asset Management Inc. is at an advanced stage to invest around Rs800 crore in Total Environment Building Systems Pvt. Ltd, a Bengaluru-based builder of homes, from its global fund, according to two people familiar with the transaction. The capital will help Total Environment refinance most of its debt and replace the existing debtors with Brookfield as the main lender. Brookfield started investing in residential real estate fund in India from its new $9 billion global real estate fund last year. The first deal saw Brookfield investing Rs450 crore in Peninsula Land Ltd’s premium project in Byculla, Mumbai. The Total Environment deal would be the second investment from Brookfield’s global corpus. “The capital will be given in the form of structured debt with an upside share, against seven of Total Environment’s projects in Bengaluru. Half of the money will be used for refinancing and the rest as working capital for i...

Shubhomoy Sikdar & Devesh K. Pandey, UPDATED: AUGUST 10, 2017 In a major breakthrough, Indian agencies on Wednesday succeeded in bringing back alleged al-Qaeda in Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) fugitive Syed Mohammed Zishan Ali from Saudi Arabia. He was wanted by the Delhi Police Special Cell since last year. A senior Delhi Police officer confirmed the news to The Hindu late on Wednesday night.   Zishan, a resident of Jamshedpur in Jharkhand, operated from Saudi Arabia. He is believed to be married to the sister of Dr. Sabeel Ahmed, a cousin of the 2007 Glasgow international airport (U.K.) attack mastermind Kafeel Ahmed, who had moved from Bengaluru to Saudi Arabia in 2010-11. The police had secured an arrest warrant against Zishan in June 2016. His name was also mentioned in a charge sheet filed against the alleged AQIS accused persons. Zishan’s brother Syed Mohammed Arshiyan, who was last spotted in Saudi Arabia, is also allegedly has links with international...

By Shivali  PUBLISHED: 15:15 BST, 3 August 2017 A new hacking tool used by the CIA has been revealed by WikiLeaks. The tool disables security cameras and corrupts recordings made on computers using Windows XP and newer versions of the Microsoft operating system Dubbed 'Dumbo', it requires an agent to directly access a computer that holds the recordings using a USB thumb drive.  WikiLeaks released information about project Dumbo on its website today. Dumbo can be used to suspend processes using webcams and corrupt video recordings. WikiLeaks said: 'Dumbo can identify, control and manipulate monitoring and detection systems on a target computer running the Microsoft Windows operating system. 'It identifies installed devices like webcams and microphones, either locally or connected by wireless (Bluetooth, WiFi) or wired networks. 'All processes related to the detected devices (usually recording, monitoring or detection of video/audio/network...

APRIL 2, 2017  | MARTIN LIBICKI China is a burgeoning great power. It is continually figuring out the various dimensions of power – not least of which is power in cyberspace – and putting them to use. Like other great powers dealing in an unknown medium, it is, to quote Deng Xiaoping, crossing the river by feeling the stones. China’s external strategies in cyberspace – as distinct from its internal social control policies – can be divided into two parts: the first, before late 2015; the second, after that point. The most notable transition, from the U.S. perspective, has been the agreement to foreswear commercial cyberespionage. Less well noted, but of comparable importance, has been the formation of its Strategic Support Force, which has combined the cyber warriors of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA), its electronic warriors, and a large chunk of those conducting intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, notably from space. Around 2000, Chinese leaders ...

By Rachita Prasad, ET Bureau|Updated: Aug 10, 2017 Malaysian government owned Petroliam Nasional Berhad, better known as Petronas, is looking to expand its operations in India by entering into more longterm contracts for supply of liquified natural gas (LNG) and scaling up its lubricants business.  The company, which has been in business with Indian companies for over two decades, is for the first time setting up headquarters for all its local businesses in Delhi, and has appointed a general manager to head it.  Thus far, it only had different senior executives dealing in specific businesses in the country. "India is a very exciting market for us given its growth rate of 7 per cent and that it is energy deficit. It is our largest market for crude and that relationship will continue. We are very bullish on petrochemicals, LNG and lubricant business in the country," Wan Zulkiflee, president and group CEO, told reporters during a visit to meet India clients.  ...

Beena Parmar,  Aug 09, 2017 State-owned Bank of India plans to augment its capital by Rs 8,000 crore this year to boost growth amid the bad loan clean-up. The bank has asked for Rs 2,500 crore capital from the government for this fiscal year and its plans to raise balance amount from the capital market and by selling non-core assets, MD and CEO Dinabandhu Mohapatra told media after the bank announced Q1FY18 results. This week, the bank already put out an RFP (request for proposal) to sell its 30 percent stake in STCI Finance, a non-deposit taking finance company where it expects to earn at least Rs 626 crore. Mohapatra expects to finalise the process for the stake sale by this month and said he has identified more assets to sell this quarter but refrained from sharing more details due to price sensitivity. Bank of India reported a turnaround in its net profit of Rs 87.7 crore for the June quarter 2017 as compared with Rs 741 crore net loss posted a year ago. The p...

Updated: August 9, 2017 13:00 IST | PTI The government has tweaked the terms of sale of its 51.11 per cent stake in Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd (HPCL) to Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) by including phrases that will help avoid triggering an open offer, an official said. The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) had on July 19 granted ‘in-principle’ approval for strategic sale of the government’s existing 51.11 per cent stake in HPCL to ONGC “along with the transfer of management control, which will result in HPCL becoming a subsidiary company of ONGC”. The Department of Investment and Public Asset Management (DIPAM) had on July 21 used the same formulation to invite expression of interest from investment and merchant bankers to manage the transaction. But, since the offer meant transfer of management control from government to ONGC, there was apprehension it would trigger SEBI’s takeover code and compel ONGC to make an open offer to acquire an additional 26 per c...

Updated: August 9, 2017, PTI Zydus Cadila has received the US health regulator’s nod to market Diltiazem Hydrochloride capsules, used to treat high blood pressure, angina (chest pain) and certain heart rhythm disorders, in the American market. The company has received final approval from the US Food and Drug Administration (USFDA) to market Diltiazem Hydrochloride extended release capsules USP in strengths of 120mg, 180mg, 240mg, 300mg and 360mg, Zydus Cadila said in a BSE filing today. The company will manufacture the product at its formulation manufacturing facility at the Pharma SEZ in Ahmedabad. As per IMS MAT August 2017 data, Diltiazem has an estimated sale of $191.1 million, it added. The Gujarat-based company has more than 140 approvals and has so far filed over 300 abbreviated new drug applications (ANDAs) since it commenced filings in 2003-04. Shares of Cadila Healthcare, the listed entity of the Zydus group were trading at Rs 492 per scrip on BSE, d...

 Ruchi Lata Pandey, Aug 09,2017 Qatar is scrapping visa requirements for visitors from 80 countries including India as it bears a boycott by four Arab states and gears up to host the World Cup in 2022. Under the new policy announced by Qatar Airways and authorities on Wednesday, citizens of 33 mostly European countries can enter without a visa for 90 days in single or multiple trips during a 180-day period. Americans, Britons, Canadians and citizens of 44 other countries can enter visa-free for an initial 30 days on single or multiple trips, and can extend that for a further 30 days. Reference http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/qatar-european-countries-india-visa-free-entry/1/1022425.html

PT Jyothi Datta, Updated: August 4, 2017 From the strident position that all doctors will have to prescribe medicines using their generic or chemical names, there appears to be a more reconciled acceptance from policy makers that doctors cannot be banned from prescribing brand names. The stumbling blocks in implementing the move, as gleaned from discussions with doctors, patients and pharma industry experts, seem to be an absence of confidence or trust in the quality of medicines being dispensed. Besides, the initiative seems to be “inherently flawed” as the very structure of the domestic pharmaceutical industry is anchored in “branded generics”. Generics are defined globally as off-patent, less-expensive drugs that are chemically similar to an innovative drug. But the Indian market is dominated by “branded” generic drugs, where many such chemically similar versions of an original drug are sold under different brand names, by different companies, at different prices. ...