Govt, Opposition trade charges on Lokpal Bill fiasco

New Delhi, Dec. 30:

The blame game on who should take responsibility for the Lokpal Bill not being passed by the Rajya Sabha started with both the Government and Opposition accusing one another of sabotaging the Bill's passage.

Addressing a press conference, the Home Minister, Mr P. Chidambaram, said that the “real story is that the BJP which opposed the Bill in the Lok Sabha had no intention of passing the Bill in the Rajya Sabha. They hit upon this ingenious device of moving 187 amendments…not only they (but) all together.”

The Home Minister said that on occasions it is possible that one or two amendments are moved in the Rajya Sabha as the Bill has been debated extensively and amendments have been considered (by the Lok Sabha).

“But what happened yesterday….187 amendments were moved the last of which was received at 6 p.m. it was pretty clear that those who moved the amendments had no intention of passing the Bill before the day came to an end. Can anyone make sense of 187 amendments,” the Home Minister said.

He maintained that the Government had discharged its obligation.

“We have done everything possible to get it passed. At least it has not been defeated. We will take it up in the Budget session and pass it,” he stressed.

‘hold fresh elections'

Meanwhile, the Bharatiya Janata Party leader, Ms Sushma Swaraj, demanded that the Government should quit and hold fresh elections as it had lost the majority in both Houses.

“A Government which runs away from voting, has no political or moral right to stay in power. It should do some introspection,” Ms Swaraj said.

Mr Arun Jaitley added that the BJP will expose the Government and make the public aware of yesterday's development.

The CPI (M) also blamed the Government accusing it of “subterfuge and sabotage” in not allowing voting on the Bill in the Rajya Sabha.

“The UPA Government is squarely responsible for this. It is most unfortunate that this sort of subterfuge and sabotage has been carried out when the people are looking up to Parliament for an effective anti-graft Bill,” the CPI (M) Leader, Mr Sitaram Yechury, said.

Taking on the Parliamentary Affairs Minister, Mr P.K. Bansal, for refusing to extend the House, Mr Yechury, said there were instances in the past when this had been done.

SBI approves revision in pension schemes

Thiruvananthapuram, Dec. 30:

The Central Board of SBI has accorded approval for revision of family pension and minimum pension with retrospective effect from November 1, 2007.

A decision to this effect was taken at a meeting of the board held last week, according to banking sources.
BASIC PENSION

For those in the scale of pay up to Rs 7,090, 30 per cent of the pay shall constitute the basic family pension. Thirty per cent of allowances which are counted for making contributions to Provident Fund but not for dearness allowance shall be the additional family pension.

The aggregate of basic and additional family pension shall not be less than Rs1,779 a month.

For those in the Rs 7,091- 14,180 scale, 20 per cent of pay shall be the basic family pension. Twenty per cent of allowances which are counted for making contributions to Provident Fund but not for dearness allowance shall be the additional family pension.

The aggregate of basic and additional family pension shall not be less than Rs 2,186 a month.

For those with a pay of Rs 14,181 and above, 15 per cent of the pay shall be the basic family pension.

Fifteen per cent of allowance which are counted for making contributions to Provident Fund but not for dearness allowance shall be the additional family pension.

The aggregate of basic and additional family pension shall not be less than Rs 2,841 a month and more than Rs 5,930 a month.

In the case of part-time employees, the minimum amount of family pension and the maximum amount of family pension shall be in proportion to the rate of scale wages drawn by the employee.

In respect of employees other than part-time employees who retired on or after November 1, 2007, the amount of minimum pension shall be Rs 1,779 a month.

In respect of part-time employees who retired on or after that date, the minimum pension payable shall be Rs 595 a month in respect of part-time employees drawing 1/3rd scale wages; Rs 892 a month in respect of part-time employees drawing 1/2 scale wages; and Rs 1,330 a month in respect of part-time employees drawing 3/4th scale wages.

Facebook becoming factor in divorce cases

London, Dec 31:

Popular social networking site - Facebook - is becoming a major factor in marriage breakdowns and is increasingly being used as a source of evidence in divorce cases.

Facebook was cited as a reason for a third of divorces last year in which unreasonable behaviour was a factor, according to law firm Divorce-Online.

The firm said it had seen a 50 per cent jump in the number of behaviour-based divorce petitions that contained the word ’Facebook’ in the past two years, The Daily Mail reported today.

Mark Keenan, managing director of Divorce-Online, said: “Facebook has become the primary method for communicating with friends for many people.

“People contact ex-partners and the messages start as innocent, but lead to trouble. If someone wants to have an affair or flirt with the opposite sex then it’s the easiest place to do it“.

Thirty-three per cent of the 5,000 behaviour petitions filed with the firm in the past year mentioned the site.

The most common reasons for Facebook causing problems in relationships were a spouse finding flirty messages, photos of their partner at a party they did not know about or with someone they should not have been with, the report said.

IOB gets new ED

 

Chennai, Dec. 31:

Mr A. D. M. Chavali, 57, has joined the Indian Overseas Bank as its Executive Director. He assumed office on Wednesday. Prior to his appointment, he was working as General Manager in Bank of Baroda, in charge of Treasury & Resource Management. During his 34 years of service in Bank of Baroda, he has served in various parts of India in various capacities, heading the corporate finance branch in Mumbai, as regional head of Kolkata and Deputy General Manager in Risk Management, says a press release from IOB.

Meanwhile, IOB has also announced that it has signed a MoU with Mahindra & Mahindra under which the bank would be a “preferred financier' for the Indian automotive major. The MoU will enable M&M customers to avail themselves of vehicle finance services from any of the over 2,000 branches of IOB.

The MOU was signed by Shri M.S. Raghavan, General Manager, Shri K. Subrahmanyam, General Manager of Indian Overseas Bank and Mr Arun Malhotra, Senior Vice-President, Sales & Customer Care, Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd. 

India Yamaha Motor sales up 29% in December

 

New Delhi, Dec 31:

Two wheeler maker, India Yamaha Motor, on Saturday reported a 29.10 per cent rise in its total sales in December at 44,976 units.

The company had sold 34,839 units in the same month the previous year, India Yamaha Motor said in a statement.

In the domestic market, the company’s sales stood at 33,290 units as against 26,567 units in the same month in 2010, up 25.33 per cent.

Exports of India Yamaha rose by 41.27 per cent to 11,686 units from 8,272 units in the year—ago period, it added.

For the entire 2011, the company’s sales increased by 31.56 per cent to 4,60,815 units from 3,50,274 units in 2010.

“The year 2011 has indeed been an exceptional year for us as we were able to maintain consistency in our overall growth and the results speak for themselves,” India Yamaha Motor CEO and Managing Director, Mr Hiroyuki Suzuki, said.

The company is buoyant about the future and is looking forward to replicate and further improve upon its achievement in 2012 as well, he added.

As part of expansion plans, the company plans to expand production capacity to one million units in 2012. Besides, it also plans to invest in product development and network expansion, the statement added.

India Yamaha currently has two manufacturing units at Surajpur in Uttar Pradesh and Faridabad in Haryana and produces motorcycles both for domestic and export markets. It has over 400 dealers across India. 

HCL Infosystems Q1 net plunges 74% on tepid sales

NEW DELHI: Quarterly net profit of HCL Infosystems plunged 74 percent as its flagship computer retailing business suffered in an economic slowdown worsened by lesser government investment in computing and office automation business.

The company earned 121.5 million rupees for July-September, compared with 474.6 million rupees a year ago.

Net sales dropped 6 percent to 27.88 billion rupees.

"Their partnership with Nokia hurt. Nokia has not been doing well, and that pressured HCL's margins. This impacts their distribution business," said a Mumbai-based sector analyst.

HCL Info has earlier this year renewed an agreement with Nokia to distribute the Finnish firm's devices. That partnership is due for renewal on Dec. 31, 2014.

A flood of cheap handsets from the likes of China's ZTE and India's Micromax is destroying Nokia's top position in emerging markets, and as Asian handset manufacturers increasingly move to Google's free Android software.

"The desktop market is also very slow. This used to be their bread and butter segment," said the analyst, who declined to be identified.

HCL has a less than 10 percent market share in personal computers. Dell , Acer and Hewlett-Packard lead the Indian market, according to a report by researcher Gartner in August.

HCL Info posted a loss of 6.8 million rupees for its computer systems and services segment, compared with a profit of 358.2 million rupees a year earlier.

"Overall System Integration business continued to be severely impacted by slowdown in projects and customer decision cycles," Chief Executive Harsh Chitale said in a statement.

Profit from the company's telecommunications and office automation business also fell 16 percent before tax to 452.5 rupees.

HCL Info shares, valued at about $300 million, were down about 3 percent at 63.40 rupees at 1.25 pm.

TVS Motor's Q2 net profit up 40 per cent

MUMBAI: Two and three wheeler major TVS Motor on Thursday reported an increase of 40 percent in its net profit for the second quarter of the current fiscal at Rs.76.51 crore from Rs.54.78 crore in the like period of 2010-11.

The company's total income for the period under review reported a growth of 23.23 percent at Rs.1,991.79 crore as against Rs.1,616.24 crore in the corresponding period of last fiscal.

The net sales in the July-September quarter rose 22.79 percent by Rs.1,952.16 crore as compared to Rs.1,589.83 crore in the like period of 2010-11.

The auto majors other income increased by 50.05 percent at Rs.39.63 crore from Rs.26.41 crore in the July-September quarter of last fiscal.

The company also reported an increase of 42.20 percent in its consolidated total income for the fiscal at Rs.135.31 crore from Rs.95.15 crore in the like period of 2010-11.

The total income for the fiscal stood at Rs.3,737.82 crore, an increase of 24.21 percent when compared to Rs.3,009.20 crore in the corresponding period of last fiscal.

Ashok Leyland Q2 net dips 7.76% to Rs 154.08 cr

NEW DELHI: Hinduja Group flagship company Ashok Leyland net profit has declined by 7.76 per cent to Rs 154.08 crore for the second quarter ended September 30, 2011, due to higher expenses.

The company had posted a net profit of Rs 167.05 crore in the same period last fiscal, Ashok Leyland said in a filing to the BSE.

Net sales of the company, however, rose to Rs 3,094.57 crore for the second quarter, as against Rs 2,713.95 crore in the same period previous fiscal.

During the quarter under review the company's total expenditure, including employee cost, stood at Rs 2,849.34 crore, as against Rs 2,473.17 crore in the same period previous fiscal.

For the six months ended September 30, 2011, the company reported net profit of Rs 240.33 crore, as against Rs 289.70 crore in the same period previous fiscal.

Shares of Ashok Leyland today closed at Rs 27.05 on the BSE, up 0.74 per cent from its previous close.

Bharti Airtel Q2 net down 38% at Rs 1027 crore, falls more than expected

NEW DELHI: India's top mobile phone carrier Bharti Airtel on Friday reported a bigger-than-expected 38 percent fall in fiscal second-quarter profit, its seventh straight quarterly profit drop, hit by higher interest costs and foreign exchange losses.

Bharti, nearly a third owned by Southeast Asia's biggest phone firm SingTel, said consolidated net profit fell to Rs 1,027 crore ($210 million) for its fiscal second quarter ended September from Rs 1,661 crore a year earlier, based on international accounting standards.

Bharti, which last year acquired mobile operations in 15 African countries in a $9 billion debt-funded deal, said consolidated revenue rose to Rs 17,276 crore from Rs 15,231 crore in the year-ago quarter.

The net profit was hurt by higher interest expenses that trebled from a year earlier to Rs 1,118 crore for the September quarter.

Currency fluctuations led to foreign exchange losses of Rs 239 crore for the quarter versus profit of Rs 249 crore in the year ago quarter.

Bharti also took on debt to pay more than $3 billion for 3G and broadband spectrum in a state auction last year.

Monthly average revenue per user (ARPU), a key metric for telecom carriers, from Bharti's Indian operations fell an annual 9 percent to Rs 183 for the quarter, while Africa ARPU fell 1 percent to $7.3.

At 10:28AM, shares in Bharti were trading up 0.7 percent at Rs 395.30 on the BSE. The stock, valued at $30.4 billion, are up 9.6 percent this year, outperforming a nearly 14 percent fall in the broader market.

Bharti Airtel, is not averse to mergers and acquisitions in India, Sanjay Kapoor, its chief executive for India and South Asia said.

Bharti, which operates in 19 countries across Asia and Africa, is the world's fifth-biggest mobile phone carrier by subscribers. India is the company's biggest market where it had about 173 million mobile users at the end of September.

Bharti last year ventured into Africa by acquiring most of the African mobile operations of Kuwait's Zain in a $9 billion debt-funded deal and became the world's fifth-biggest mobile carrier by subscribers.

But high costs in Africa have kept margins under pressure and it has yet to turn a profit there.

However, the outlook for India's mobile sector has improved after carriers including Bharti raised voice call prices in July by about a fifth, the first such increase in at least two years in the ferociously competitive market after a vicious price war had sent call prices tumbling and squeezed profits.

Bharti and its rivals in the world's second-biggest mobile phone market of about 870 million users are also betting on a pick up of premium third-generation (3G) mobile data services after they launched high-speed networks this year.

"India has achieved double-digit growth fueled by non voice businesses. The arrest of continuously declining prices in India augurs well for the telecom industry," Bharti Chairman Sunil Mittal said in a statement.

To launch wireless broadband in India this fiscal

Bharti Airtel will launch wireless broadband services in India in the current fiscal year ending March 2012, its chief executive for India and South Asia Sanjay Kapoor said.

The company has already finalised the vendors, Kapoor said, but did not share details.

Trai raises SMS limit to 200 per day per SIM

Mobile phone users will now be able to send 200 text messages a day as sector regulator Trai has doubled the daily cap after it received representations from consumers and service providers to relax the limit.

Trai had introduced the 100-SMSes a day cap to stop unsolicited and pesky text messages from telemarketers selling everything from real estate to weight loss solutions. The cap also put an end to subscribers using multiple SIM cards to send text messages without registering as telemarketers.

However, consumers felt an equal impact because their daily text message communication got restricted to only 100 text messages. After Trai imposed new regulations on telemarketers on September 27, service providers such as Airtel, Vodafone and Idea Cellular stopped offering message packs that, for instance, allowed consumers to send 21,000 text messages a month for Rs 88. In some cases, service providers offered message packs of only 3,000 text messages a month or 100 text messages a day, in accordance with Trai norms.

The regulator said on Tuesday that it had received representations from consumers and service providers to relax the limits. "The authority has received representations from some of the service providers and consumers to increase the limit of 100 SMS per day per SIM. The authority has considered these representations and decided to increase the limit of one hundred SMS per day per SIM to two hundred SMS per day per SIM," Trai said in a statement.

Service providers are likely to begin offering the improved message packs at the earliest as they would like to pass on the benefit of these changes to more than 850 million mobile phone subscribers across the country.

"All operators will begin giving larger SMS packs," a senior executive from a mobile services provider said. Bharti Airtel, the largest telco by subscribers and market share, said, "Trai's extension of the per day SMS limit per SIM to 200 is in response to the needs of customers who are frequent users of SMS services and were in favour of relaxation of this restriction. Bharti Airtel will continue to comply with SMS regulations as per government policy."

2ergo India, a value-added services provider that offers bulk SMS as part of its business, said the change did not impact telemarketers. "Firstly, they should not be using SIM cards for sending promotional messages, and instead buy bulk SMS capacities from service providers. If any small business did intend to use a SIM card, then the increase from 100 to 200 has marginal benefit," said 2ergo India MD Raj Singh. Cellular Operators Association of India welcomed the regulators new decision.

Black Money: IT Dept Sends Notice

The Indian Income Tax Department has started sending notices to persons involved in black money cases on the basis of information received from abroad, even as Indian Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee said their names would be disclosed after initiation of prosecution proceedings.

The notices are being sent by the Directorate of Criminal Investigation (DCI) to individuals and entities across countries following scrutiny of classified banking data received from foreign countries about Swiss Bank accounts.

"As and when the information (is received), investigation starts, prosecution takes place (and) matter comes to the court. Then, as per the existing treaty terms, we can reveal the names in cases of prosecution by the Income Tax Department," Mukherjee told reporters here when asked whether the government has received information about industrialists and MPs in connection with black money.

The minister had earlier said the government has received information from France about the overseas bank accounts of Indians. "In 69 cases, the taxpayers have admitted to unaccounted income of Rs 397.17 crore. Taxes of Rs 30.07 crore have also been paid," he had said.

India, according to the Finance Ministry, has so far received over 9,900 pieces of information from several countries regarding suspicious transactions by Indian citizens, which are now under different stages of processing and investigation.

The Department of Criminal Investigation will initiate legal proceedings in several cases in the next few months, sources said, adding that the cases would be dealt with under criminal provisions of the IT Act.

In a number of cases being probed by the DCI, the department plans to conducts searches and surveys for obtaining additional information.

The New Google

It is going to be a game changer, and on a big scale, but no one’s clear exactly how. The $12.5-billion acquisition of Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc. gives Google 17,000 registered patents, and another 7,500 pending ones. Google itself has a small number, and in its attempt to buy Nortel’s 6,000 patents, was outbid by a consortium led by Microsoft and Apple (Google offered $900 million, the consortium paid $4.5 billion). So most analysts agree that the Motorola acquisition is a defensive move to give Google teeth in its patent battles.

Google faces several patent challenges against its Android operating systems for mobile phones. Oracle Corp has claimed in court filings that the Android system infringes on its patents that use Java programming tools; Apple has filed suit indirectly, by suing Samsung, HTC and Motorola claiming Android infringes upon its tablet and smartphone patents. Analysts say there are roughly 250,000 patent claims for mobile phones, many of which are questionable.

Rumours about Google’s acquisition of Motorola first surfaced in January 2010, but nothing seemed to come of it then. Is the purchase of Motorola expensive? Not as much as Microsoft’s acquisition of Skype, according to some — Google is paying a 63 per cent premium over market price of Motorola’s shares, at $40 a share.

Google says other Android OS users — in effect Motorola’s competition — will continue use the Android OS; it is not licensed, but Google makes a large amount of money selling advertising with Internet searches conducted using Android phones. The larger question is: if what Google wanted was just the patents, why not buy just them instead of the company? Google did that when it bought IBM’s 1,000 patents.

If Google’s purchase of Motorola is to integrate software and hardware into the same company a la Apple, another company is taking a different route to the same end. Two days after Google’s announced purchase, Hewlett Packard (HP), the world’s largest PC maker, announced it was in talks to buy Autonomy, a Cambridge-based firm that makes software that searches and organises data, for $10 billion. Autonomy is listed on the London Stock Exchange.

At the same time, HP will spin off its printers and PC businesses into a separate entity, if not sell it off entirely. The move is being read as HP’s attempt at becoming more of a software company. When HP hired Leo Apotheker as CEO, it announced that in the future, it would underscore software. Apotheker used to run, SAP, one of the world’s largest software firms. Some time ago, HP bought EDS, a technical services firm that made Ross Perot a billionaire, and subsequently bought Palm, the developer of Web OS.

On Friday, HP announced that it will discontinue operations for webOS devices, specifically the TouchPad and webOS phones. In an earnings call with analysts on Thursday, Apotheker had said “consumers are changing the use of their PC. The tablet effect is real and sales of the TouchPad (HP’s answer to IPad) are not meeting our expectations.” The PC market is contracting, but Apple’s Macs have outsold the rest for 21 consecutive quarters.

Google Buys Zagat

Google Inc has bought popular dining ratings authority Zagat, adding a valuable brand to its content offerings and bolstering its push into the rapidly growing local commerce market.

Local commerce offers services such as finding a discount from a nearby store, or a review of a neighborhood eatery, and the world's No. 1 search engine plans to compete in this market against Yelp and OpenTable.

The deal, for which Google did not provide financial information, gives it valuable content about restaurants, hotels and nightclubs that can be paired with its popular online maps and mobile search services.

Google needs to provide more than just directions to consumers seeking information about restaurants and other local businesses, said Marissa Mayer, Google's VP of Local, Maps and Location services, in an interview with Reuters on Thursday.

"It's also (about) getting them a sense of the place. A sense of what to expect," said Mayer. "Zagat reviews, in a few short lines and a few scores, gives you a great sense of a place very quickly when you're on the go."

The move is part of Google's push to adapt its online services for a world in which consumers increasingly access the Web on mobile phones such as Apple Inc's iPhone and rely on social networking services such as Facebook to get information from friends.

Last month, Google announced plans to acquire mobile phone manufacturer Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion. The deal, if approved by regulators, will allow Google to produce its own line of smartphones based on its Android software.

"A reasonable person would say that Google may never beat apple in product design by itself. At least not for a sustainable period of time. But Google could better integrate content and have that become another reason to buy those devices," said Stifel Nicolaus analyst Jordan Rohan.

The 32-year-old Zagat, which polls consumers and compiles reviews about restaurants around the world, will become a cornerstone of Google's "local offering", Google said.

"This underscores Google's local and mobile initiatives," said Brian Pitz, an analyst at UBS, who expected the acquisition to provide a boost to Google Maps as customers look for restaurants. Last year, Google moved Mayer, a top search executive, to head its local initiatives.

Google needs reviews and other content for its "Google Places" websites, in part to fend off criticism. It has been accused of using comments from review sites such as Yelp, essentially siphoning off their readers and, more importantly, their clicks. Google has toned down its borrowing of comments recently, Pitz said.

The Federal Trade Commission has been looking into the issue as part of a broad antitrust investigation, a source familiar with the probe has said.

The move raises the question of whether the search giant will start its own restaurant reservation service, building on existing ties with restaurants that advertise on it.

The shares of restaurant-booking service OpenTable, which also publishes reviews and ratings, closed down more than 8 percent at $57.50 on Thursday after hitting a low of 54.50 earlier in the day.

OpenTable is already reeling from financial results that have disappointed investors this year and the departure in May of CEO Jeffrey Jordan, who joined venture-capital firm Andreessen Horowitz. Jordan remains chairman.

Pitz said expanding into reservations would require extra steps such as building out reservation software and getting restaurants to install it, as well as building different relationships with the restaurants.

"It's apples and oranges," he said.

While much of Zagat's content is free and available to anyone, some content remains behind a paywall and it was unclear if Google would remove it.

Founded by Tim and Nina Zagat, the eponymous service provides the familiar burgundy pocket-sized guides to restaurants in more than 100 cities. It may be one of the earliest forms of user-generated content, Google Vice President Marissa Mayer said in a blog post on Thursday.

Zagat gave Google a tongue-in-cheek rating on its home page on Thursday, awarding the Internet company a maximum 30-point rating for its "local, social, mobile and usefulness" categories. Industry analysts regard the local, social and mobile markets as some of the fastest-growing areas of the technology sector.

"We are thrilled to see our baby placed in such good hands and to start today as official 'Googlers,'" the founders said in a joint statement.

Zagat enlisted Goldman Sachs to explore a sale as early as 2008, although no buyers emerged in the middle of a recession. The company might fetch as much as $200 million, it was reported at the time.

In late 2009 Google was in talks to acquire Yelp for at least $500 million, according to news reports at the time, but the deal fell apart.

The Domain Magic

If you had to compromise on your company’s domain name because a cyber-squatter was quicker than your own IT team, brace up to snap up your ideal domain name in the next round. The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann), the apex body that assigns domain names globally, will accept applications for top-level domain (TLD) names between January and April 2012. TLDs are the 22-strong family of domain names such as the .com, .net and .in. According to Icann, entrepreneurs, businesses, governments and communities can apply to operate a TLD of their own choosing. That makes .India — rather than the .in that is used as the country code — as much a possibility as .reliance, .tata or .Rajinikanth, for a substantial price, of course. Currently, there are more than 240 country code TLDs (including applications for dependent territories, etc).

New Forms

Icann, which expects 300-500 TLD applications, will charge $185,000 (about Rs 85 lakh) for every TLD name. Registrants will also have to pay either a quarterly fee of $6,250 (Rs 2.8 lakh) or an annual fee of $25,000 (Rs 11.5 lakh). Any entity can apply for a TLD as long as it fulfils conditions in the Applicant Guidebook for TLD registrations. For the first time ever, applications for Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs) was called for. Simply put, IDNs sport characters used in local languages not written with the basic Latin alphabet (a-z), European-Arabic digits (0-9) and the hyphen. At the Icann meet in June, several companies and communities expressed their interest in registering their own TLDs.

While the communications and IT ministry plans to apply for .bharat and .India, Mumbaikars too are readying for their own identity. A company called India TL Domain has got support from the city administration to register the .mumbai TLD and recover its investment by selling generalised TLDs such as www.narimanpoint.mumbai. Icann expects that all major global corporations and organisations to move to secure their domain names. The interested parties for now include Canon, Deloitte and Unicef.

Icann is primarily looking at four major categories: brands (those who lost out on registering their desired .com), generic names such as .game and .business, those based on geography such as .himalayas, .delhi or .agra, which can be used to promote tourism and local culture, and those for a cause or community such as .indian, .painter, .lawyer or .doctor.

The need for more names was triggered by the overwhelming demand for a .com name — which was the first and the most generic domain name. But the irony is that the more Icann opened up .aero, .biz, .coop, .info, .museum, .name, and .pro in the first round of domain name expansion in 2000, the more registered with .com for exclusivity. As a result, many missed a .com name. More than 200 million domain names are registered in the world today and about 84 million of them are registered in .com. Nearly 15 million are registered in .net. 

Trouble Links


But even as the programme gains momentum, opposition is also building up. Experts say that flooding the Web with new domain names would create new avenues for cyber-squatting and online fraud. “Even now, rogue websites attempt to gain traffic directed to another site,” says Paula Greve, director of Web security research at McAfee.

Clearly, the enormous fees for registering TLDs could deter cyber-squatters who registered names such as tata.com and dhirubhaiambani.com in the first rush (before they were evicted). But how will Icann determine the right authority applying for the domain? Icann says it has defined strict evaluation criteria on who can apply for which domain names. Icann sees greater possibilities of disputes in generic TLDs, which could prolong the process of evaluation. While a non-disputed application may take nine months to process, a highly complex one would require about 20 months.

Icann says it will also examine applications for trademark violations. It has set up a dispute resolution process for cyber-squatting cases. A “clearinghouse” will let brand-owners block third parties from registering their marks under any new domain name. For this, Icann has set up a process — Uniform Domain-Name Dispute-Resolution Policy (UDRP). “In most cases, genuine squatting can be dealt with as routine encroachment and resolved using UDRP and other existing legal mechanisms. Also, the UN’s World Intellectual Property Organization is working on a set of processes, which will make it easier for a brand to complain against cyber squatting,” says Bhavin Turakhia, founder and CEO of Web-hosting firm Directi.

But what will Icann do if a .reliance is applied for by both Reliance Industries (which uses www.ril.com) as well as the current owner of www.reliance.com? “Icann will look if any one applicant has some right to that word. Then the next step could be an auction,” says Manish Dalal, vice-president APAC of naming services division at communications major VeriSign. “Take the word shop for example. It is a generic word and nobody has any intellectual property rights around it. Hence, it may be sold in an auction, too.” Categorisation on the basis of brands, geographies and causes will help reduce multiple applications, as they are generally unique and can be easily evaluated, adds Dalal.

Critics, however, say that though companies can create their own TLDs, mid-level players may not be able to buy domain names due to the high fee. “Trademark protections were identified in the community during programme implementation as an issue that needed to be addressed,” says Icann spokesperson Brad White. “New protections include a rapid takedown process (Uniform Rapid Suspension), the mandatory Trademark Claims and Sunrise processes to be conducted by all registries and a post-delegation dispute process where claims can be made directly against registries.”

In an era where promoters register their domain names before they register companies, the Icann move has come as a breath of fresh air. It is equally important that it irons out all the issues before it goes live with the TLD sales.

Microsoft Considers Bidding For Yahoo

Microsoft Corp is considering a bid for Yahoo Inc, resurfacing as a potential buyer after a bitter and unsuccessful fight to take over the Internet company in 2008, sources close to the situation said on Wednesday.

Microsoft joins a host of other companies looking at Yahoo, which has a market value of about $20 billion and is readying financial pitch books for potential buyers, they said.

Those companies include buyout shops Providence Equity Partners, Hellman & Friedman and Silver Lake Partners, as well as Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba and Russian technology investment firm DST Global, the sources said.

Yahoo shares jumped 10.1 per cent on the news to close at $15.92 on Nasdaq, but fell back to $15.34 in after-hours trading. Microsoft shares ended 2.2 percent higher at $25.89.

Microsoft may seek a partner to go after Yahoo, one of the sources said, without identifying any parties.

No decision has been made and a bid may not materialize as there are internal divisions at the software company on whether it should pursue Yahoo again, a high-ranking Microsoft executive said.

One camp inside Microsoft is hot for the deal, believing that it would obliterate AOL Inc as a competitor and create a strong Web portal that can offer better products to audiences, advertisers and end users, the executive said.

However, another camp is against the deal, feeling that if Microsoft is going to invest billions of dollars in an acquisition it should be one that has more growth potential. Microsoft last tried buying Yahoo in 2008, offering to pay as much as $47.5 billion, or $33 per share.

"Yahoo's value hasn't grown in years, and some executives feel we should buy something that is more forward-looking," said the executive, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Yahoo, Microsoft and the other potential buyers declined to comment.

Any auction process for Yahoo is still in the early stages, and the company's financial advisers -- Goldman Sachs and Allen & Co -- are preparing to send financial information to potential bidders, sources have said previously.

Big Bite
Shortly after ousting Carol Bartz as CEO in early September, Yahoo said it was exploring strategic alternatives after receiving "inbound interest" from a number of parties.

The once-dominant Internet pioneer is pursuing parallel tracks, sounding out deal options as well as engaging in a search for a new CEO.

Yahoo would be a big bite for any single private equity firm, especially at a time when financing markets for leveraged buyouts have dried up.

Industry sources said private equity firms could take over the US operations and sell Yahoo's Asian assets to a buyer such as Alibaba.

"There are many reasons why this thing probably makes sense," said Sid Parakh, analyst at fund firm McAdams Wright Ragen. "If you strip out the variety of assets Yahoo owns, you are pretty much paying nothing for the core business."

One Wall Street analyst recently valued Yahoo at just over $20 billion, with its core search and display advertising business worth $7.7 billion, its Asian assets worth $9.2 billion, plus $3.2 billion in cash.

Yahoo owns about 40 percent of Alibaba as well as about 35 percent of Yahoo Japan.

If Microsoft fully combined its Bing Internet search business with Yahoo's, it would give it more than 30 percent of the U.S. search market and make it a credible competitor to Google, said Parakh.

Under a 10-year deal struck in 2009, Microsoft's Bing already powers Yahoo search, but it cedes 88 per cent of resulting advertising revenue back to Yahoo.

Microsoft, with a cash pile of $53 billion, could certainly afford a deal, but some doubted the world's largest software company would actually pursue it, given its previously failed bid and the existing Yahoo agreement.

"I think it's unlikely because they (Microsoft) have been down this path before," said Ben Schachter, an analyst with Macquarie Research.

"In a lot of ways they've gotten what they want out of it already, with the (Yahoo) search deal. I could make a case for a lot of synergies. But it's certainly not a strategic priority in any way."

Silicon Valley sources said Jack Ma, the founder and CEO of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba -- who last month expressed interest in buying Yahoo -- could team up with private equity to make a deal.

Or it may make more sense for Ma to team up with Microsoft, said Susquehanna Financial Group analyst Herman Leung.

"If Microsoft gets involved, then you don't need private equity," said Leung. "The problem for Jack Ma is capital. Microsoft has $53 billion in cash. Why have to deal with bondholders and all this stuff when Microsoft can make that all happen for you?"

Culture Clash
Some also have expressed concerns about cultural fit and Microsoft's ability to manage such a large deal.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has had an antagonistic relationship with Yahoo, and the company has never successfully integrated a large acquisition.

Microsoft's 2007 deal to buy online ad firm aQuantive for $6 billion was a flat-out failure. Its $8.5 billion deal to buy Internet phone service Skype has not yet been completed, so integration efforts have not yet begun.

Microsoft is making slow progress in combating Google's dominance in search advertising. According to the latest figures from research firm comScore, Google has 64.8 per cent of the US search market, Yahoo has 16.3 per cent and Microsoft 14.7 per cent.

But even with traffic from Yahoo, Microsoft still has not attracted enough advertising dollars and profitability in search is a long way off.

Last quarter, Microsoft's online services unit -- which includes Bing and the MSN web portal -- lost $728 million. It has lost almost $6.5 billion over last three fiscal years.

Petrol Price Hiked Again

state-owned oil companies on Thursday effected yet another steep hike in petrol price, by Rs 1.80 per litre with effect from midnight, the 5th increase this year, coming on top of falling rupee and rising cost of imported crude.

Petrol price in Delhi will cost Rs 68.64 per litre, up from Rs 66.64 a litre. The retail selling price in different cities will vary according to the local sales tax.

"Crude oil has been more or less steady but rupee depreciation is a cause of concern. We have been forced to increase prices because of rupee depreciation," BPCL Chairman and Managing Director R K Singh told PTI. The base price has been increased by Rs 1.50 per litre.

"Rupee has depreciated from Rs 46.25 a dollar to Rs 49.40, increasing our cost of imports," IOC Director (Finance) P K Goyal said.

Sources said Oil Minister Jaipal Reddy consulted Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee before oil companies were given a green signal to raise prices.

The heads of three oil companies ---IOC, BPCL and HPCL-- met here this evening to decide on the price hike after they got a firm green signal from the oil ministry, they added.

This is the second hike in petrol prices in less than two months and it came on a day when the food inflation rose "dangerously" to 12.21 per cent for the week ended October 22.

Oil marketing companies had earlier hiked petrol prices by Rs 3.14 a litre on September 16 when the rupee was ruling at about 48 to a US dollar.

The government had in June last year deregulated or freed petrol from all price controls but the retail rates have not moved in line with cost as high inflation rate forced the oil companies to seek 'advice' from parent oil ministry before revising rates.

This is the sixth price increase since petrol price was deregulated, after excluding minor changes resulting from duty changes and increase in dealers commission.

On Wednesday, Reddy had met Mukherjee to appraise him of the precarious financial health of oil companies. Earlier in the day today, the oil ministry sent a detailed note to the Cabinet Secretariat seeking urgent action on deteriorating financial health of oil PSUs.

The Oil Ministry in its note pointed that Indian Oil, Bharat Petroleum and Hindustan Petroleum together will lose about Rs 1,30,000 crore in revenue this fiscal on selling diesel, domestic LPG and kerosene at government-controlled rates.

Sources said the three companies are losing Rs 333 crore per day on selling fuel below cost.

State-owned oil firms are currently losing Rs 9.27 per litre on diesel, Rs 26.94 per litre on kerosene sold through the public distribution system (PDS) and Rs 260.50 per 14.2-kg LPG cylinder supplied to households for cooking purposes.

While the loss on these three products are compensated through a combination of government cash subsidy and upstream oil firm doleouts, no such mechanism exists for making good the losses on petrol as the product is deregulated.

The three firms are virtually living on borrowed money as they had to raise funds to meet even working capital requirement in the absence of fuel selling price not meeting even operating expenses.

The oil ministry had also requested for an early meeting of the high-powered ministerial panel to decide on ways to deal with the crisis.

The Empowered Group of Ministers (EGoM) meeting is being sought before the winter session of Parliament that begins on November 22.

The ministerial panel is essentially a consensus building body of the Congress-led UPA government and comprises of key allies like DMK, TMC and NC. The allies had in September scuttled plans to limit supply of subsidised LPG cylinders to 4-6 per household a year with a view to reduce subsidies.

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List of Top 10 Banking Companies in India

State Bank of India

No. of offices	11447
No. of employees	205896
Business per employee (in ` lakh)	556.00
Profit per employee (in ` lakh)	4.74
Capital and Reserves & surplus	57948
Deposits	742073
Investments	275954
Advances	542503
Interest income	63788
Other income	12691
Interest expended	42915
Operating expenses	15649
Cost of Funds (CoF)	5.85
Return on advances adjusted to CoF	3.83
Wages as % to total expenses	16.64
Return on Assets	1.04
CRAR	14.25
Net NPA ratio	1.76

HDFC Bank

No. of offices	1400
No. of employees	52687
Business per employee (in ` lakh)	446.00
Profit per employee (in ` lakh)	4.18
Capital and Reserves & surplus	14652
Deposits	142812
Investments	58818
Advances	98883
Interest income	16332
Other income	3291
Interest expended	8911
Operating expenses	5533
Cost of Funds (CoF)	6.83
Return on advances adjusted to CoF	8.12
Wages as % to total expenses	15.50
Return on Assets	1.28
CRAR	15.69
Net NPA ratio	0.63

Axis Bank

No. of offices	786
No. of employees	20624
Business per employee (in ` lakh)	1060.00
Profit per employee (in ` lakh)	10.02
Capital and Reserves & surplus	10215
Deposits	117374
Investments	46330
Advances	81557
Interest income	10835
Other income	2897
Interest expended	7149
Operating expenses	2858
Cost of Funds (CoF)	5.88
Return on advances adjusted to CoF	4.69
Wages as % to total expenses	9.97
Return on Assets	1.44
CRAR	13.69
Net NPA ratio	0.40

Bank of India

No. of offices	2934
No. of employees	40155
Business per employee (in ` lakh)	833.00
Profit per employee (in ` lakh)	7.49
Capital and Reserves & surplus	13495
Deposits	189708
Investments	52607
Advances	142909
Interest income	16347
Other income	3052
Interest expended	10848
Operating expenses	3094
Cost of Funds (CoF)	5.79
Return on advances adjusted to CoF	4.00
Wages as % to total expenses	13.90
Return on Assets	1.49
CRAR	13.01
Net NPA ratio	0.44

Punjab National Bank

No. of offices	4323
No. of employees	54780
Business per employee (in ` lakh)	654.92
Profit per employee (in ` lakh)	5.64
Capital and Reserves & surplus	14654
Deposits	209760
Investments	63385
Advances	154703
Interest income	19326
Other income	2920
Interest expended	12295
Operating expenses	4206
Cost of Funds (CoF)	6.05
Return on advances adjusted to CoF	4.62
Wages as % to total expenses	17.72
Return on Assets	1.39
CRAR	14.03
Net NPA ratio	0.17

Bank of Baroda

No. of offices	2916
No. of employees	36838
Business per employee (in ` lakh)	914.00
Profit per employee (in ` lakh)	6.05
Capital and Reserves & surplus	12836
Deposits	192397
Investments	52446
Advances	143986
Interest income	15092
Other income	2758
Interest expended	9968
Operating expenses	3576
Cost of Funds (CoF)	5.36
Return on advances adjusted to CoF	3.58
Wages as % to total expenses	17.34
Return on Assets	1.09
CRAR	14.05
Net NPA ratio	0.31

ICICI Bank Limited

No. of offices	1408
No. of employees	34596
Business per employee (in ` lakh)	1154.00
Profit per employee (in ` lakh)	11.00
Capital and Reserves & surplus	49883
Deposits	218348
Investments	103058
Advances	218311
Interest income	31093
Other income	7604
Interest expended	22726
Operating expenses	7045
Cost of Funds (CoF)	5.97
Return on advances adjusted to CoF	4.09
Wages as % to total expenses	6.62
Return on Assets	0.98
CRAR	13.96
Net NPA ratio	2.09

Union Bank of India

No. of offices	2569
No. of employees	29014
Business per employee (in ` lakh)	694.00
Profit per employee (in ` lakh)	6.28
Capital and Reserves & surplus	8740
Deposits	138703
Investments	42997
Advances	96534
Interest income	11889
Other income	1483
Interest expended	8076
Operating expenses	2214
Cost of Funds (CoF)	6.15
Return on advances adjusted to CoF	4.27
Wages as % to total expenses	11.19
Return on Assets	1.27
CRAR	12.01
Net NPA ratio	0.34

Citibank

No. of offices	41
No. of employees	4795
Business per employee (in ` lakh)	1880.10
Profit per employee (in ` lakh)	45.12
Capital and Reserves & surplus	11518
Deposits	51677
Investments	24519
Advances	39920
Interest income	6840
Other income	3582
Interest expended	2429
Operating expenses	2587
Cost of Funds (CoF)	3.57
Return on advances adjusted to CoF	9.04
Wages as % to total expenses	17.56
Return on Assets	2.12
CRAR	13.23
Net NPA ratio	2.63

Canara Bank

No. of offices	2740
No. of employees	44090
Business per employee (in ` lakh)	780.17
Profit per employee (in ` lakh)	4.97
Capital and Reserves & surplus	12208
Deposits	186893
Investments	57777
Advances	138219
Interest income	17119
Other income	2311
Interest expended	12401
Operating expenses	3065
Cost of Funds (CoF)	6.75
Return on advances adjusted to CoF	3.69
Wages as % to total expenses	12.14
Return on Assets	1.06
CRAR	14.1
Net NPA ratio	1.09

Best Credit Cards in India

In a developing country like India, credit cards usage is gradually leaping. Several banks and financial organizations are offering credit cards to their customers. Different people want different services from a credit card. Choosing the best credits cards in India is very critical decision. First of all, you need to understand your wants and needs before signing up for a credit card.

Credit cards let you borrow money from your financial organization. The cardholder can shop with the card to his heart's content but he needs to pay back all his debts within the prescribed time. This is the primary condition of a credit card. Some credit card companies give 30-days time to clear all the debts. If you falter to pay back the debt, you have to face the financial barriers. There are some parameters to check before landing on the most suitable credit card for you. If your concern is budget, your choice f credit cards will be different from the lavish spenders. Given below are some of the best credit cards in India:

Standard Chartered Credit cards: Standard Chartered offers a number of credit cards for various people. They can choose the best one according to their affordability and needs. Some best credits cards offered by Standard Chartered are:

Platinum Elite Card
Super Value Titanium Card
Platinum Rewards Card
Emirates Platinum Card
Preferred World Credit Card
Gold Rewards Card
Manhattan Platinum Card

Super Value Titanium Card by Standard Chartered offers cash back rewards. This credit card lets the cardholder save a lot. The cardholder can save up to 5 percent on every payment. This credit card is ideal for those, who are looking for a tight budget credit card.

Standard Chartered Emirates Platinum Credit Card is one of those credit cards offered by Standard Chartered, which is suitable for those who love lavish shopping. This card comes with 25000 airline miles as bonus on first usage of the card. Among the other benefits, the cardholder can earn 4 airline miles after spending 150 ` with the card.

ICICI Bank Credit Cards: ICICI credit cards are various kinds of cards, which can cater for different people. Some of the most sought credit cards offered by ICICI are:

Signature Credit Card
British Airways American Express Green Credit Card
Singapore Airlines VISA Platinum Credit Card
Platinum Identity Credit Card
Kingfisher Airlines MasterCard
Ascent American Express® Cards
HPCL Titanium Credit Card
Instant Gold Credit Card
Instant Platinum credit card
If you want budget credit cards, ICICI Bank American Express Green Credit Card is best for you. This card gives one reward point to the cardholder on his every 40 ` Signature Credit Cards by ICICI bank are ideal for those who want to spend lavishly.

Apart from these two banks, Citibank credit cards are also popular in India. All these credit cards can be accessed 24*7 and can be use overseas.

List of Credit Cards in India

Credit cards or plastic money is slowly and steadily replacing the paper currency in India these days. The young and dynamic workforce that is hugely responsible for driving the Indian economy are the major credit card holders in the country. Call it style statement or anything else the trend of carrying bundles of notes is no more in fashion. People simply prefer a plastic card than physical money.

In the current scenario the major credit card providers in India are ICICI, Standard Chartered HDFC and HSBC. Known for providing value added services along with customer-favorable credit card deals these banks are said too have the highest number of credit card users in the country. According to recent statistics the number of credit card holders in India has exceeded 27 million.

Most of the banks and financial concerns in India offer different kinds of credit cards for different segments of customers. However an ideal credit card is that which offers the best services, suits all your needs and most importantly charges low interest.


List of Credit Card issuing Banks in India
Below is a list of the popular Credit Card issuing Banks in India
ICICI Bank, HDFC, American Express, ABN Amro, Axis Bank, Bank of Baroda, Canara Bank, SBI, Citibank, HSBC, Deutsche Bank, Barclays Bank, Citibank, Standard Chartered and Kotak Mahindra.

Types of credit cards in India
Gold Credit Cards, Silver Credit Cards, Premium Credit Cards, Business Credit Cards, Cash Back Credit Cards, Airline Credit Cards, Low Interest Credit Cards, Balance Transfer Credit Cards Lifetime Free Credit Cards, Auto and Fuel Credit Cards and Co-branded Credit Cards

List of Best Credit Cards in India

American Express Gold credit card
Indian Overseas Bank Visa International Credit card
Axis Platinum card
Bank of India's India Card
Gold International Card
Citibank Dinners Club International card
Union Bank of India Silver Card
Syndicate Global Classic Credit Card
Union Bank of India Gold Card
ICICI Bank Online card
Syndicate Global Gold Credit Card
CorpBank Gold card
Vijaya Bank Visa Gold Credit Card
HSBC Platinum card
Vijaya Bank MasterCard Global Card
CorpBank Classic card
Vijaya Bank VISA Classic International Card
HDFC Silver credit card
Vijaya Bank MasterCard Classic Credit Card
HDFC Cooperate credit card

Railway Budget 2011-12

Highlights of Railway Budget 2011-12

1.No hike in passenger fare and freight rates.

2.Highest ever Plan outlay of ` 57, 630 crore proposed for Railways.

3.9,583 crore provided for new lines.

4.1300 km new lines, 867 km doubling of lines and 1017 km gauge conversion targeted in 2011-12.

5.56 new Express Trains, 3 new Shatabdis and 9 Duronto trains to be introduced.

6.AC Double Decker services on Jaipur-Delhi and Ahmedabad-Mumbai routes.

7.New Super AC Class to be introduced.

8.A new portal for e-ticketing to be launched shortly. Booking charges will be cheaper with a charge of only ` 10 for AC classes and ` 5 for others.

9.Pan-India multi-purpose smart card "Go India" to be introduced.

10.236 more stations to be upgraded as Adarsh Stations.

11.47 additional suburban services in Mumbai and 50 new suburban services proposed for Kolkata.

12.Two new passenger terminals in Kerala and one each in Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal proposed.

13.Feasibility study to raise speed of passenger trains to 160-200 kmph to be undertaken.

14.A special package of two new trains and two projects for the States managing trouble free run of trains through out the year.

15.Anti Collision Devise (ACD) sanctioned to cover 8 zonal railways.

16.GPS Based 'Fog Safe' Device to be deployed.

17.All unmanned level crossing upto 3000 to be eliminated.

18.All India Security Help line on a single number set up.

19.All state capitals in the North-East except Sikkim to be connected by Rail in next seven years.

20.A Bridge Factory in J & K and a state-of-art Institute for Tunnel and Bridge Engineering is proposed at Jammu.

21.A Diesel Locomotive Centre will be set-up in Manipur.

22.A Centre of Excellence in Software at Darjeeling proposed under the aegis of CRIS.

23.Rail Industrial Parks at Jellingham and New Bongaigaon proposed.

24.Additional mechanized laundry units to be set up at Nagpur, Chandhigarh and Bhopal.

25.700 MW gas-based power plant to be set up at Thakurli in Maharashtra.

26.18,000 Wagons to be procured during 2011-12.

27.A scheme for socially desirable projects, 'Pradhan Mantri Rail Vikas Yojana' with Non-lapsable fund proposed.

28.10,000 shelter units proposed for track side dwellers in Mumbai, Sealdah, Siliguri, Tiruchirapalli on pilot basis.

29.Concession to physically handicapped persons to be extended on Rajdhani and Shatabdi trains.

30.Concession of 50% to press correspondents with family increased to twice a year.

31.Senior Citizens concession to be hiked from 30 % to 40 %.

32.Medical facilities extended to dependent parents of the Railway employees.

33.Scholarship for Girl child of Group-D railway employees increased to ` 1200 per month.

34.20 additional hostels for children of railway employees to be set up.

35.Recruitment for 1.75 lakh vacancies of Group 'C' and 'D' including to fill up backlog of SC/ST initiated, 16,000 ex-servicemen to be inducted by March 2011.

36.A separate sports cadre to be created.

37.2011-12 declared 'Year of Green Energy' for Railways.

38.Freight loading of 993 MT and passenger growth of 6.4 % estimated for 2011-12.

39.Gross Traffic Receipts at ` 1,06,239 crore, exceeding one lakh crore mark for the first time estimated.

40.Ordinary Working Expenses assessed at ` 73,650 crore.


The 2011 -2012 Budget session will begin on February 21. The date for the presentation of the Union Budget is February 28 and the Railway Budget will also be presented soon after that. Usually the railway budget is presented two days before the Union Budget.

The 2011 2012 Budget session will begin with a joint sitting of the two Houses that will be addressed by President Pratibha Patil. This was decided at the CCPA which was attended by ministers such as Minister of Agriculture Sharad Pawar, Minister of Overseas Indian Affairs and Civil Aviation Vayalar Ravi, Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee, Textiles Minister Dayanidhi Maran, Law and Minister Veerappa Moily.

Due to the numerous calamities and mishaps that took place in the year 2010 the railway department is expecting two times the budget allotted in the previous year. Currently the railway budget is undergoing a financial crisis and in order to overcome it; the department would require an increase in the budgetary support from the Finance Ministry of India.

The railway department has requested for Rs 39,600 crore as gross budgetary support in 2011 as compared to the Rs 15,875 crore that it received in the 2010 budget. This whooping expectation is not only to repair the damages but also for the ongoing and upcoming railway projects. The railway department also aims at further expanding and modernizing the railway infrastructure of the country.

The 2011 railway budget aims at increasing the production of wagons, coaches and locos, gauge conversion and doubling of tracks and laying of 1000 km of railway tracks. There will also be an increase in the number of trains and freight carriers.

The target of the department is to increase the number of coaches from 3700 in the previous year to 4000 coaches in 2011-12. In the wagon manufacturing segment the department plans to churn out 18,000 wagons and as far as locomotives are concerned they are expected to increase by another 5000.

The 2011 railway budget will also give importance to safety and security issues like improving the signaling system, train protection warning system (TPWS) and installing safety related technology like Anti-collision devices (ACD)

Mamata Banerjee presents Railway Budget 2011 ETNOW

Polaris Software Lab Ltd

About Polaris Software Lab Ltd

Polaris Software Lab Ltd, a public listed company found in the year 1993 is the world's most sophisticated insurance and banking Software Company. Polaris offers state of the art comprehensive solutions for core banking, wealth and asset management, insurance and corporate banking. The company is rated among the top 8 Information Technology service providers in the global banking scenario. The headquarters of the Polaris are located at Chennai; India the company has more than 10,000 experts in various fields to cater to their global client requirements.


Brief History

More than 25 years ago, Polaris began its journey by partnering with Citibank for creating India's first Automated Teller Machine (ATM). The company was recognized for creating the first banking solution on distributed architecture by Smithsonian Institute in the year 1993. Polaris gained two very important experiences while working for Citibank. The first was creation of critical solutions with pioneering functionality which could be implemented and replicated anywhere in the world. Second was the creation of a successful outsourcing model that enabled the company to exceed the outstanding global standards.

Company Facts

Polaris has BS7799 certification
Polaris ranked 9th in NASCOMM's top 20 exporters list for 2004-2005
Polaris has in excess of 10,500 associates
Polaris has 23 international offices and 4 global near shore development centers
Polaris has 7 business solution centers focusing in micro verticals
Polaris is world's 1st CMMi (Capability Maturity Model Integrated) Level 5 Certified Company
Polaris has over 20 years of experience in banking, financial services and insurance

Field of Expertise

Polaris has expertise in a range wide of sectors consisting of wealth management, retail banking, investment banking, and process consulting enterprise solutions, pace testing, insurance and corporate banking. Other areas of expertise include expertise that helps the company to reach their goals quickly and efficiently and help build more experts in the society.

Corporate Social Responsibility

As a part of the company's social responsibility initiative, the company set up Ullas Trust in the year 1997. One of the primary tasks of this trust is to nurture dreams and encourage a sprit of belief that things can happen among economically backward adult students. Under this trust each Polarite counsels a disadvantaged student by acting as his/her role-model and financing 40% of a scholarship while Polaris donates the rest.

Overseas Oprerations
Polaris has overseas operations in:
Canada
United States of America
United Kingdom
Germany
France
Chile
Hong Kong
Netherlands
Spain and Korea
Switzerland
Ireland
Singapore
Australia
Saudi Arabia
Bahrain
UAE
Japan

Products and Services
Outsourcing
Retail Banking
Corporate Banking
Capital Markets and Asset Management
Insurance

Products
Intellect Universal Banking
Intellect Consumer Finance
Intellect Wealth Management
Intellect Cards
Intellect Portals
Intellect Cash & Liquidity
Intellect Risk & Treasury
Intellect Front Office

Services
Enterprise Solutions
Technology CoE
Testing CoE
Performance Engineering
Domain Led
Infrastructure Led

Address

Corporate Headquarters
Polaris Software Lab Ltd.
'Foundation', No. 34, IT Highway,
Chennai - 603 103
India
Phone: +91-44-2743 5001
Fax: +91-44-2743 5166
Email: marketing@polaris.co.in
Registered office
Polaris Software Lab Ltd.
Polaris House, 244 Anna Salai
Chennai - 600 006
India
Phone: +91-44-2852 4154
Fax: +91-44-2852 3280
Email: marketing@polaris.co.in

L&T Infotech

L&T Infotech is one of the best software companies in India. It is a fully owned subsidiary of Larsen & Toubro and was established in 1997. L&T Infotech over the years has made a remarkable place for itself in the global IT world mostly because of its Business to IT connect solutions.

Contact Details
L&T Technology Center
Gate No.5, Saki Vihar Road,
Powai, Mumbai 400072
Phone: +91 22 6776 6776
Fax +91 22 6776 6004

Iflex Solutions Ltd.

This is also one of the top software companies in India. Spread across 130 countries across the globe this company has almost become synonymous with providing IT solutions especially to financial companies.

Contact Details
399 A, Subhash Road, Vile Parle East
Mumbai, Maharashtra 400057
Phone: 022 6718500
MphasiS

MphasiS was founded in India in 2000. Based in Bengaluru, MphasiS is among the largest software companies in India. Spread across 14 countries MphasiS earned whopping revenue of US$767.58 million in 2010.

Contact Details
Leela Business Park, 2nd Floor,
Andheri Kurla Road, Sahar, Andheri(East),
Mumbai: 400059, India
Phone: work91-22--56777777

Patni Computer Systems

Patni Computer Systems is one of the most important information technology and business solutions providers in India. Patni deals with a client list of about 400 Fortune 1000 companies. Spread across 23 countries this software company in India was founded on 10 February 1978. The company was initially established as a data converting organization by the CEO Narendra Patni and his wife. The company made consolidated revenues of US$702.57 million.

Contact Details
# 43, Velankani Complex,
2nd Phase Hosur Road
Electronic City
Bangalore - 560100.
Phone: 28520335

Tech Mahindra

Tech Mahindra is a joint venture between BT Group plc of UK and the Mahindra Group. Holding the title of the fifth largest software exporting company in India Tech Mahindra has grown by leaps and bounds since its inception in 1986. Known for providing quick telecom services this software company in India earned revenues of $976.6 million in 2010.

Contact Details
Mahindra India & World Headquarters
Mahindra Towers
G M Bhosale Marg
Mumbai 400018
India
Phone: +91 1800 425 1624

HCL Technologies

 

The Indian IT market has been overflowing with players from all over - be it domestic or overseas. HCL Infosystems Ltd is one of the leaders in the Indian IT market, which was established in the year 1976. For more than twenty five years, they have developed and applied solutions to different market segments, spanning across a wide range of Indian technologies. They have always taken the lead for bringing in new technologies and solutions in the IT market.


Alliance & Partnerships of HCL Infosystems Ltd

HCL Infosystems Ltd has the capability of providing rich world-class solutions and services to all its customers and that have been all the more possible with alliances and partnerships with leading global IT companies.

Alliance partners of HCL Infosystems

Intel
AMD
Microsoft
IBM
Bull
Toshiba
Nokia
Sun Microsystems
Ericsson
NVIDIA
SAP
Scansoft
SCO
EMC
Veritas
Citrix
CISCO
Oracle
Computer Associates
RedHat
Infocus
Duplo
Samsung
Novell

Alliances with these global IT majors have enabled HCL to get access to the best of technology & products. The product portfolio gets enhanced on the other hand.

Strengths of HCL Infosystems Ltd

They understand the business of the customer and provide the apt technology to them
They have a long committed relationship with their customers
The support provided by the company is pan India
Customers get their value for money
They are the leaders in technology

HCL Infosystem's leadership initiatives

They gave the country's first DeskTop PC - BusyBee in 1985.
India’s first branded home PC – Beanstalk was launched in 1995 by HCL
HCL also gave India’s first Pentium 4 based PC at a sub 40k price mark
They also boast of providing India’s first Media Center PC

Financial highlights of HCL Infosystems for the third quarter of 2009

1.HCL Infosystems has registered a consolidated revenue of ` 3027.5 crore (USD 632.8 Million) for the quarter ended September 30, 2009.

2.The consolidated services revenue for the same quarter was ` 146.7 crore (USD 30.7 Million), growing at12% on a Y-o-Y basis.

3.The consolidated profit before tax for the third quarter for the company was ` 83.0 crore (USD 17.3 Million).

4.Consolidated profit after tax for the same quarter was ` 59.0 crore (USD 12.3 Million).

5.Computer Systems business generated revenue to the tune of ` 817.4 crore (USD 170.9 Million) for the third quarter.

6.Profit before interest & taxes for Computer Systems business for the September quarter, 2009 was ` 48.3 crore (USD 10.1 Million).

7.Telecommunication and Office Automation business generated revenue which amounted to ` 2221.6 crore (USD 464.4 Million), for the third quarter, growing at a marginal rate of 2%.

8.Profit before interest & taxes for Telecommunication and Office Automation business was ` 55.6 crore (USD 11.6 Million) for the same quarter.


Financial overview of HCL Infosystems Ltd for a span of five years:
(Rs/ Crore)

Particulars
 (year ended
June 30)    2008    2007    2006    2005    2004

Total Revenue    12605    11855    11455    7787    4412

PBIDT    489    454    396    308    238

Depreciation    19    15    12    15    18

Profit
before Tax    430    429    385    296    211

Provision for
Tax        130    113    105    68    36

Profit after Tax
(PAT)        300    316    280    228    175

Profit available
 for

appropriation    904    792    640    491    352


Contact details of HCL Infosystems Ltd
Corporate Office
E-4, 5 & 6, Sector 11
NOIDA 201 301, UP
India
Tel: +91 120 2526518/19, 2520977
Fax: 2550923 

infosys bangalore campus

Infosys Mysore

Infosys Technologies Ltd

Infosys Technologies Ltd is one of the biggest names in the Indian IT industry. This multinational IT services company with offices in 22 countries and development centers in India, Japan, China, Australia, UK and Canada, is headquartered in Bangalore, India. Currently (as of September 30, 2009), Infosys has 105,453 employees in its payroll. From a mere US$ 250 company in 1981, Infosys Technologies Ltd. has come up a long way to become a global leader with revenues of more than US$ 4 billion.

Infosys Technologies Ltd. "defines, designs and delivers technology-enabled business solutions" to its clients worldwide. It leverages its domain and business expertise as well as the strategic alliance with leading technology providers while developing its business solutions.

One of the major initiatives of Infosys Technologies Ltd. is its Global Delivery Model (GDM). It came forth as a disruptive force that leads to the rise of offshore outsourcing. Infosys has also made a mark in the software industry by its highly innovative solution for the banking industry - "Finacle".


Brief History

Infosys Technologies Limited started its journey on July 2, 1981 when N R Narayana Murthy along with six others, Nandan Nilekani, Kris Golapakrishnan, N S Raghavan, S D Shibulal, Ashok Arora and K Dinesh launched a software development company, called "Infosys Consultants Pvt. Ltd." with N S Raghavan being the first employee of the organization. The company started with a capital of INR 10,000 which Mr. Murthy borrowed from his wife Sudha Murthy. The operation started in the house of Raghavan in Model Colony in north-central Pune, which was the registered office of the organization. However, the office shifted to Bangalore next year, which became the headquarters of the organization soon.
The Growth

It's the year 1993 when Infosys went public. The IPO of Infosys was undersubscribed, which was later bailed out by Morgan Stanley, when it took up 13% of its equity (at the offer price of ` 95 per share). In 6 years, the price of the share soared up to ` 8,100 to make it the costliest share in the market in 1999. It came into the list of 20 biggest companies on NASDAQ in terms of market capitalization, leaving behind the big names like Adobe Systems, Lycos and Novell.

The sales and earnings of Infosys Technologies Ltd, since the listing on BSE till 2000, compounded over 70% a year. In 2000, the then US President Bill Clinton praised India for its accomplishments in high-tech areas referring the example of Infosys.

Awards and Accolades

As the company started growing at a higher pace, honors and accolades also started pouring in. In 2001, Business Today rated it as "Best Employer in India". Hewitt Associates also rated it the best employer to work for in the three consecutive years in 2000, 2001 and 2002.

Infosys Technologies Ltd. was also the only Indian company to win the prestigious Global MAKE award for the three consecutive years in 2003, 2004 and 2005. It also found place in the Global Hall of Fame for that.

Infosys was adjudged among world's 5 best performing companies in software and services sector by Forbes in April 2009. In the same year, the organization was rated amongst the "50 Most Innovative Companies" by Business Week.
Offerings

Infosys offers a range of solutions to its global customers. It offers solutions to wide array of industries. It provides various services like IT services, Engineering services, BPO services and consulting services etc.

Industries

Infosys Technologies offers services to the following industries:

Aerospace and Defense
Airlines
Automotive
Banking and Capital Markets
Communication Services
Consumer Packaged Goods
Discrete Manufacturing
Education
Energy
Healthcare
High Technology
Hospitality and Gaming
Insurance
Life Sciences
Logistics and Distribution
Manufacturing
Publishing
Resources
Retail
Studios and Networks
Utilities

IT Services

The IT Services offered by Infosys include the following:
Application Services
Architecture Services
Enterprise Quality Services
Independent Validation Services
Information Management Services
Infrastructure Services
Knowledge Services
Packaged Application Services
SOA Services
Systems Integration Services

Engineering Services

Infosys offers concept-to-market R&D and engineering services, which help its clients to improve their product operations. The services focus on the complete engineering value chain of different industries. Following engineering services are offered:

Lifecycle Management
Manufacturing Process and Plant Solutions
Product Engineering


Consulting Services

The consulting services offered by Infosys are meant to make its clients stronger and more competitive and also make them capable to manage global business more efficiently. Following consulting services are offered:

Core Process Excellence
Information & Technology Strategies
Learning & Complex Change
Next Generation Commerce
Product Innovation


BPO Services

Infosys Technologies Ltd. has a strong BPO division that delivers world-class process outsourcing.

Offerings by Industry
Aerospace and Automotive
Banking and Capital Markets
Communication Service Providers
Energy and Utilities
Healthcare
Insurance
Life Sciences
Manufacturing
Media and Entertainment
Retail and Consumer Packaged Goods
Services
Transportation and Services
Offerings by Function
Business Platforms
Customer Service Outsourcing
Finance and Accounting
Human Resource Outsourcing
Knowledge Services
Legal Services
Order Management
Sourcing and Procurement Outsourcing

Products

Infosys has got the following products and platforms that offer holistic and integrated transformation approach.

Collaborative Analytics
Infosys ActiveDesk
Infosys iProwe
Infosys mConnect
Infosys Unified Communications and Collaboration (UC)

Finacle Solutions

Finacle solutions are meant for the banking industry. Following are the solutions provide:
Core Banking
e-Banking
Mobile Banking
Treasury
Finanz Tools
CRM
Alerts
Wealth Management

Address

Infosys Technologies Ltd.
Plot#44
Electronics City
Hosur Road
Bangalore 561 229
Karnataka, INDIA
Tel: +91-80-28520261 / 351 / 363
Fax: +91-80-28520362
Web: www.infosys.com