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 Bussiness Insider India December 13, 2020 IANS As the deadline for bidding for Air India ends on Monday, reports have suggested that leading corporate houses Tata, Adani and Hinduja may be interested. The final date for submission of bids for Air India strategic sale is December 14 and the government has not extended the deadline. However, the government has extended the intimation date for bidders for Air India to January 5, from the earlier date of December 29.  This is the date for announcing the shortlisted bidders. The physical bids need to be in by December 29. The government has been trying for two years to divest its Air India. It wants to divest 100 per cent stake in Air India and budget carrier AI Express, and sell its 50 per cent share in Air India SATS Airport Services, a joint venture with Singapore-based ground handling firm SATS. The government has further sweetened the deal and now it will be sold on its enterprise value.   Reports...

 India produced an estimated 107.59 million tonnes (mt) of wheat this year. Out of that crop, marketed in April-June at the height of the lockdown, 38.99 mt or over 36% was bought by the Food Corporation of India (FCI) and state government agencies. Both numbers – output as well as procurement – were records. And they matter, particularly when much of the government’s relief to those worst hit by the Covid-related economic dislocations has been in the form of free grain rather than cash. In 2019-20 (April-March), foodgrain offtake from public warehouses, for distribution through fair price shops and under various welfare schemes, totalled 62.19 mt. That allocation is up more than half, at 94.63 mt, in the current fiscal. This includes not just 60.17 mt under the National Food Security Act (NFSA), which entitles 80 crore-plus persons to 5 kg of wheat or rice each per month at Rs 2 and Rs 3/kg, respectively. There is an additional 32.91 mt Covid-special allocation, mainly under the P...

 A recent report brought out by the Union ministry of rural development claims that poverty should not be measured by the lack of a subsistence level of income alone. Subsistence income is usually estimated by the rupee equivalent of a certain basket of food that guarantees a minimum calorific intake per person per day. Economists are prolific in coming up with alternative measures of poverty. Contending measures thus abound. This particular report emphasizes the importance of including basic education, affordable healthcare, hygienic sanitation and shelter in estimating subsistence. These are issues on which there would hardly be any debate. Measurements would not pose a major headache either as ample statistics are available to include a number of socio-economic factors into a multi-dimensional estimate of poverty. There is nothing novel about this proposal. But there are a couple of important issues that need to be kept in mind regarding a multi-dimensional index. The first is t...

 In the context of the ongoing farmer protests in some parts of the country, Ramesh Chand, a member of Niti Aayog, explains the reason why the government had to introduce changes. “The debate on the Farmers’ Produce Trading and Commerce Act 2020 (FPTC Act) has seen some misinformation and qualms among stakeholders, especially farmers in some states,” he states. From the 1960s, there have been concerted efforts to bring all wholesale markets for agricultural produce in various states under the Agriculture Produce Market Regulation (APMC) acts. All states, except Kerala, Jammu and Kashmir and Manipur, enacted such laws. The APMC Acts mandated that the sale/purchase of agricultural commodities is carried out in a specified market area, and, producer-sellers or traders pay the requisite market fee, user charges, levies and commissions for the commission agents (arhatias). These charges were levied irrespective of whether the sale took place inside APMC premises or outside it and the ch...

 India has ordered its 4,000 military shops to stop buying imported goods, according to a document reviewed by Reuters, a move that could send an unwelcome signal to foreign liquor firms such as Diageo and Pernod Ricard. India’s defence canteens sell liquor, electronics and other goods at discounted prices to soldiers, ex-servicemen and their families. With annual sales of over $2 billion, they make up one of the largest retail chains in India. The Oct. 19 internal order from the defence ministry, reviewed by Reuters, said that in future, “procurement of direct imported items shall not be undertaken”. The order said the issue had been discussed with the army, air force and navy in May and July, and was aimed at supporting Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s campaign to promote domestic goods. A defence ministry spokesman declined to comment. The order did not specify which products would be targeted. However, industry sources said they believed imported liquor could be on the list. Impo...

 The government on Thursday unveiled a new series for the consumer price index for industrial workers (CPI-IW), a measure of inflation used to calculate dearness allowance for government employees, wages for industrial workers and dearness relief for pensioners. The new series will account for changing spending habits of the working class in the organised sector. In the new series, the base year for calculating the CPI-IW has been revised to 2016 from 2001. The new series has been necessitated by changing consumption habits, relative prices of various commodities as well as spending patterns of the country’s workforce in regular jobs. The CPI-IW is the basis for calculating wages and pay perks of virtually the entire organised-sector workforce, including bank employees and insurance-sector employees. Also Read: IMF says Asia faces long recovery slog even as China grows The new index assigns more weight to spending on services such as education, healthcare, housing, travel and trans...

Financial Express October 06, 2020 "Solar PV manufacturing is one of the strategic sectors announced by the government as part of the post-COVID-19 Aatmanirbhar Bharat recovery initiative. Efforts are underway to make India a global hub for solar PV manufacturing," Kant said. Solar photovoltaic (PV) manufacturing is one of the strategic sectors announced by the government and India has the opportunity to be the global hub for this, Niti Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant said on Tuesday.  Addressing a virtual conference on ‘India PV Edge 2020: Re-Define What is Possible’, Kant said the government is confident of building competence, capabilities and capacities, especially in the sunrise areas of growth.“Solar PV manufacturing is one of the strategic sectors announced by the government as part of the post-COVID-19 Aatmanirbhar Bharat recovery initiative. Efforts are underway to make India a global hub for solar PV manufacturing,” he said. The Niti Aayog CEO further said India with its hug...

 Business Line October 05, 2020 States to also get ₹24,000-cr IGST dues as borrowing issue remains unresolved The GST Council meeting on Monday remained inconclusive on the issue of borrowing to meet the compensation shortfall and will meet again on October 12. But the Council agreed to release ₹24,000 crore I-GST (Integrated Goods & Services Tax) for the financial year 2017-18 to States, which had not received the full amount as only a temporary settlement was made at that time. It has also been decided to disburse immediately to States/UTs the ₹20,000 crore collected so far this fiscal year through the compensation cess. “It is not correct that States that are not going for any borrowing option will not get anything. No State/UT is going to be denied compensation. Nobody ever thought that there will be a pandemic. However, compensation will be paid whether shortfall is on account of GST implementation or on account of the pandemic,” Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman told me...

EnergyWorld,  October 07, 2020 Briefing the media after the meeting, Union Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said that the Directorate General of Hydrocarbons (DGH) will suggest an e-bidding platform for users New Delhi: Bringing in reforms in  natural gas marketing ,  the Union Cabinet  on Wednesday approved a standardised bidding process for  gas prices . Briefing the media after the meeting,  Union Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan  said that  the Directorate General of Hydrocarbons (DGH ) will suggest an e-bidding platform for users. He noted that producers will have a choice to opt for a platform and transparent and open bidding process to be conducted for  price discovery . Further, post the latest decision, the producing company cannot participate in the bidding process, while affiliate companies can participate in the bidding process. https://energy.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/oil-and-gas/cabinet-approves-reforms-in-natu...

 Business Standard October 05, 2020    In one of the biggest acquisitions in logistics segment,   Adani Ports   and Special Economic Zone Limited (“APSEZ”), India’s largest port developer, today completed the acquisition of Krishnapatnam Port Company Ltd., (KPCL) for an enterprise valuation of Rs. 12,000 crore. APSEZ will buy a controlling stake of 75 per cent in KPCL from the CVR Group and other investors. In FY21, the port is expected to generate an EBITDA of approximately Rs.1,200 crore resulting in an acquisition EV/ EBITDA multiple of 10x. KPCL operates a multi-cargo facility port situated in the southern part of Andhra Pradesh. This acquisition will accelerate APSEZ’s target to 500 MMT of capacity by 2025 and is another step in implementing APSEZ’s stated strategy of cargo parity between west and east coasts of India. Karan Adani, Chief Executive Officer and Whole Time Director of APSEZ said: “I am happy that KPCL the second largest private port in India h...

 Indian Express September 24, 2020  By: Harikishan Sharma An amendment to Essential Commodities Act, 1955 deregulates key foodstuffs except under extraordinary circumstances. Why was the need felt, and why have farmers and the Opposition raised concerns over it? On Tuesday, Rajya Sabha passed the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020 which is aimed at deregulating commodities such as cereals, pulses, oilseeds, edible oils, onion and potatoes. The Bill had been introduced and passed in Lok Sabha last week. It replaces an ordinance that the government had promulgated on June 5, along withB. As with the two other ordinances (also passed as Bills) that have seen protests from farmers in Punjab and Haryana, there have been concerns about the provisions of this Bill, too. What is the Bill about? It is a four-page Bill that amends the Essential Commodities Act, 1955, by introducing a new Subsection (1A) in Section 3. After the amendment, the supply of certain foodstuffs — incl...

 Hindustan Times September 24, 2020 By: Aurangzeb Nashqbandi The Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020, the Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020, and the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020, have been passed by both the Houses of Parliament during the monsoon session and await Presidential assent The Congress will launch from Thursday its nearly two-month-long “mass movement” against the government for passing “anti-farmer and anti-poor” bills during the monsoon session of Parliament. The party will also collect two crore signatures from protesting farmers against the proposed laws. The Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020, the Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020, and the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020, have been passed by both the Houses of Parliament during the monso...

 Hindustan Times September 24, 2020 By: Rahul Singh According to the CAG report, the defence ministry stated as recently as October 2019 (the first Rafale was handed over in France on October 8, 2019) that the vendors had not yet been able to confirm their capability for technology transfer. Two weeks after the Indian Air Force (IAF) formally inducted five of the 36 Rafale jets ordered from France under a Rs 59,000-crore deal, the country’s top auditor on Wednesday said that the plane’s maker Dassault Aviation and weapons-supplier MBDA have not confirmed the transfer of technology (ToT) to the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), which was part of the contract. The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG), in a detailed report tabled in Parliament, doubted if the ToT for a key engine would even take place, and pointed out that several offset contracts built into multiple defence deals have “not yielded the desired results”. The critical observations were part of CAG’s...

 The Wire September 23, 2020 By: Karan Thapar In a powerful and passionate interview with frequent flashes of anger and displays of emotion, former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Farooq Abdullah has said that at this moment the Kashmiri people do not feel and do not want to be Indian. He even went so far as to say that they would rather be ruled by the Chinese, a point he reiterated when he was asked if he really meant this. Abdullah, who heads the National Conference party and had been the most prominent ‘pro-India’ face in Jammu and Kashmir for the past four decades, also described the Kashmiris as slaves who were being treated like second class citizens. In a 44-minute interview to   The Wire , Abdullah said it was complete rubbish for the Bharatiya Janata Party to claim that the people of Kashmir have accepted the August 2019 changes just because there have been no protests. He said if the soldiers on every street and Section 144 were to be lifted, people will come ...

The Indian Express August 27, 2020 The Union government has moved a proposal to amend the Representation of the People (RP) Act 1950 to give legality to its March 6 order setting up a Delimitation Commission for Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Assam and Nagaland. The Law Ministry had notified the Delimitation Commission for the four northeast states and Jammu and Kashmir on March 6. Former Supreme Court judge Justice Ranjana Prakash Desai is its chairperson, and Election Commissioner Sushil Chandra is the EC’s representative on the panel. As first reported by  The Indian Express  on July 17, this notification violates Section 8A of the RP Act 1950. SK Mendiratta, who served with the EC for over 50 years, had red-flagged this in a letter to the three election commissioners in June. Section 8A of the RP Act 1950, introduced by Parliament in 2008, states that delimitation in the four northeast states, when held, would fall within the EC’s remit. Hence, any delimita...

Deccan Chronicle August 27, 2020 Sri Lanka will adopt an "India first approach" as its new foreign policy plank and protect New Delhi's strategic security interests, the country's Foreign Secretary Jayanath Colombage has said as he sought to allay concerns amid China's growing presence in the island nation. Admiral Colombage became the first-ever foreign secretary from a military background when he was appointed by President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to head the Foreign Ministry on August 14. In an interview published by Daily Mirror on Wednesday, Colombage said Sri Lanka is to adopt an ‘India first approach' as its new regional foreign policy plank. "That means Sri Lanka will not do anything harmful to India's strategic security interests," said Colombage, who was the chief of the Sri Lanka Navy between 2012-14 and later became a foreign policy analyst mostly on the Chinese initiatives in Sri Lanka and the immediate region. Colombage sa...