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SAIL not a part of cartelisation`

New Delhi, May 05: Barely a day after pulling out of the Indian Steel Alliance, state-run Steel Authority of India Ltd on Monday said it has never been a part of any cartelisation.

"We have never been part of cartelisation and we shall not be a part of it. Our company does not increase the prices in cartelisation," Chairman of SAIL Sushil Kumar Roongta told reporters on the sidelines of a CII national seminar on corporate social responsibility here.

Government-run steel giants SAIL and Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Ltd (RINL) have decided to pull out of the alliance amid fears that steel makers have formed a cartel to raise prices, which is augmenting the inflationary pressure on the economy.

Roongta said the alliance was not serving the purpose of steel manufacturers and hinted that the company may join another organisation dealing with issues of steel producers.

In a reply to a query on possible correction in steel prices, the SAIL Chairman said it could not be in near future due to surging input costs.

"We wish steel prices reduce further, but going by international prices, there may not be any major correction," he said.

Roongta said the biggest increase in input cost has been due to soaring prices of coking coal, a vital raw material used for steel manufacturing. "The prices have gone up from 98 dollars to 305 dollars," he said.

Asked if sail could reduce steel prices in future, all Roongta said was the company did not increase its prices in April. "We will consider it when the need be," he said.

The SAIL Chairman said the steel prices had shot up to about Rs 50,000 a tonne in early march this year, but due to government`s initiatives, there has been a reduction of 15-18 percent or Rs 8,000 per tonne. "If it stays at this level, then it is a good relief," he added.

About the proposed tie-up between SAIL and Australian firm BHP Billiton for supply of coking coal to the former, Roongta said the agreement is likely to be signed this month.

He said sail will have to import about 12-13 million tons of coking coal this year to meet the requirement of its steel plants.

After food; US now blames India, China for rising oil prices

Washington, May 06: Close on the heels of President George Bush`s remarks linking Indians` food habits to rising global prices of commodities, the United States has now partly attributed the surge in oil futures to the increased demand in India and China. White House Deputy Spokesman Scott Stanzel made these remarks while he responded to a question on the crude oil prices crossing USD 120 per barrel.

"There are a lot of different ways that we can reduce our dependence, but we have more to do and it`s just - and also I would point out that, obviously, the demand for oil is growing around the world," Scott Stanzel said in a briefing.

"Many developing nations like India or China are having greatly increased demand, which obviously is having an impact on price," the senior White House official stated..

The senior White House official stressed that it was important for the United States to become less dependent on foreign sources of energy.

Highlighting the need for "domestic exploration", he said "We also have to do more in terms of building refineries. We haven`t built refineries in about 30 years".

Stanzel also spoke regarding Bush`s remarks, which have drawn a lot of flak from every section in India, saying the United States saw "higher living standards" of people there as a "good thing".

"We think that it is a good thing that countries are developing; that more and more people have higher and higher standards of living," he said.

However, he apparently did not go back on Bush`s point that Indian food habits were contributing to spiraling prices of commodities, which in turn, were worsening the global food crisis.

Over 60,000 dead and missing in Myanmar cyclone

Yangon, May 06: The death toll from the cyclone that battered Myanmar last weekend rose above 22,000 Tuesday as the international community prepared to rush in aid, state radio reported.

A news broadcast on government-run radio said that 22,464 people have now been confirmed dead from Cyclone Nargis, which tore through the country`s rice bowl and biggest city of Yangon early Saturday.

The broadcast added that thousands more are missing.

Relief efforts for the stricken area, mostly in the low-lying Irrawaddy River delta, have been difficult, in large part because of the destruction of roads and communications outlets by the storm.

In the cyclone`s aftermath, state radio reported that the government was delaying a constitutional referendum in areas hit hardest.

Saturday`s vote on a military-backed draft constitution would be delayed until May 24 in 40 of 45 townships in the Yangon area and seven in the Irrawaddy delta, which took the brunt of the weekend storm, the radio said.

It indicated that the balloting would proceed in other areas as scheduled.

The U.N. World Food Program, which was preparing to fly in food supplies, offered a grim assessment of the destruction: up to a million people possibly homeless, some villages almost totally destroyed and vast rice-growing areas wiped out.

"We hope to fly in more assistance within the next 48 hours," WFP spokesman Paul Risley said in Bangkok. "The challenge will be getting to the affected areas with road blockages everywhere."

Based on a satellite map made available by the United Nations, the storm`s damage was concentrated over about a 11,600-square-mile (30,000-square-kilometer) area along the Andaman Sea and Gulf of Martaban coastlines — less than 5 percent of the country.

But the affected region is home to nearly a quarter of Myanmar`s 57 million people.

Images from state television showed large trees and electricity poles sprawled across roads as well as roofless houses ringed by water in the delta, regarded as Myanmar`s rice bowl.

Aid agencies reported their assessment teams had reached some areas of the largely isolated region but said getting in supplies and large numbers of aid workers would be difficult.

Richard Horsey, Bangkok-based spokesman for the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Aid, said the airport closest to the delta region was located in Yangon.

"For those places accessible by land, there will be cars and trucks from those areas to meet at the halfway point with vehicles from Yangon," he said. "For remote areas, assessment teams and assistance teams will need to go by helicopters and boats."

The delta is riddled with waterways but Horsey said they are not easily accessible, even during normal times.

"More or less all the land lines are down and it`s extremely difficult to get information from cyclone-affected areas. But from the reports we are getting, entire villages have been flattened and the final death toll may be huge," said Mac Pieczowski, who heads the International Organization for Migration office in Yangon, in a statement.

The country`s ruling military junta, which has spurned the international community for decades, urgently appealed for foreign aid at a meeting Monday among Nyan Win and diplomats in Yangon.

"Instead of waiting for figures on casualties and damage, it will be practical to send humanitarian aid to victims as soon as possible," Relief and Resettlement Minister Maj. Gen. Maung Maung Swe told a press conference Tuesday.

The appeal came less than a week ahead of the referendum on a military-backed constitution that the junta hoped would go smoothly in its favor, despite opposition from the country`s feisty pro-democracy movement. However, the disaster could stir the already tense political situation.

A military transport plane flew from Bangkok to Yangon on Tuesday with emergency aid from Thailand while a number of other countries and organizations said they were prepared to follow.

The United States, which has slapped economic sanctions on the country, said it likewise stood ready, but that a U.S. disaster team must be invited into the country.

"Our biggest fear is that the aftermath could be more lethal than the storm itself," said Caryl Stern, who heads the U.N. Children`s Fund in the United States. UNICEF said it had dispatched five assessment teams to three of the affected areas and lifesaving supplies were being moved into position.

Other countries, from Canada to the Czech Republic and Singapore, reacted quickly to the crisis with pledges of aid.

The European Commission was providing US$3.1 million (euro2 million) in humanitarian aid while the president of neighboring China, Hu Jintao, promised assistance without offering details.

The diplomats said they were told Myanmar welcomed international aid including urgently needed roofing materials, medicine, water purifying tablets and mosquito nets. The Thais were sending a shipment of supplies.

The appeal for assistance was unusual for Myanmar`s ruling generals, who have long been suspicious of international organizations and have closely controlled their activities.

The wife of the U.S. president said her country was ready to pump aid into Myanmar for recovery efforts, but that the ruling junta must accept a U.S. disaster response team.

First lady Laura Bush, who has been the administration`s chief voice on human rights and political conditions in Myanmar, faulted the junta for proceeding with the constitutional referendum, and criticized government leaders for not sufficiently warning citizens about the storm.

"We know already that they are very inept," she said.

There was little sign of official efforts to repair the damage in Yangon, but the worst-hit areas were in the countryside, now largely inaccessible by road because of the storm damage.

"The combination of the cyclone and the referendum within a few days of each other makes an angry population angrier and vulnerable and makes the political situation more volatile" than it has been since last year`s massive pro-democracy demonstrations, said Monique Skidmore, a Myanmar expert at Australian National University.

At least 31 people were killed and thousands more were detained when the military cracked down on peaceful protests in September led by Buddhist monks and democracy advocates.

The government had apparently taken few efforts to prepare for the storm, which came bearing down on the country from the Bay of Bengal late Friday.

"The government misled people," said Thin Thin, a grocery story owner in Yangon. "They could have warned us about the severity of the coming cyclone so we could be better prepared."

Yangon was without electricity except where gas-fed generators were available and residents lined up to buy candles at double the usual price. Most homes were without water, forcing families to stand in long lines for drinking water and bathe in the city`s lakes.

Decker: We Never Got $33 Offer in Writing
Posted May 06, 2008 01:23am

Monday was a rough day for *****, with shares plunging 15% in the wake of the weekend collapse of merger talks with Microsoft. *****’s President, Sue Decker, sat down with me in San Francisco and recounted her version of events during the 3-month takeover battle. She reiterated what looks to be a key ***** theme: Jerry Yang & Co. never received written confirmation of Microsoft’s $33 raised bid.

This is an echo of comments made by ***** sources over the weekend (including those to the Wall Street Journal and CNBC). In addition, when I asked Decker which shareholders support the Board’s decision to hold firm at $37, she referred back to the original formal bid: "The work our Board did was to go around and talk to shareholders at the price Microsoft offered in writing, which was $31 a share."

Decker said that the deal wouldn't necessarily

Bank launches fund transfer through mobiles

Bangalore, May 06: HDFC Bank on Tuesday launched an array of banking and commerce services over the mobile phone that would allow customers to transfer funds, shop and make payments using Ngpay - a mobile commerce network.

With this launch, HDFC Bank said it has become the first bank in India to offer, on one single platform, a full suite of services.

HDFC Bank customers who are registered for fund transfer facility under the bank's net-banking services can download the Ngpay application on their mobile handsets and begin transferring funds immediately.

"Fund transfer will happen in real-time between two HDFC Bank accounts and within 48 hours when transferring to a non-HDFC Bank account", Rahul Bhagat, country head - retail liabilities, marketing & direct banking channels, HDFC Bank, told reporters here.

Ngpay CEO Sourabh Jain, said starting next month, HDFC Bank customers will also be able to buy and sell units of different HDFC mutual fund schemes through Ngpay.

crude now at record high 122.56.

Birla Sun Life market share at 6.6%

Hyderabad, May 06: Birla Sun Life Insurance Company Ltd (BSLI)'s market share has increased to 6.6 per cent amongst private life insurance players as on March 2008.

The company's individual life business has a market share of 6.6 per cent, while the group business has a market share of 7.8 per cent amongst private players, Vikram Mehmi, President and CEO, BSLI, told mediapersons here on Monday.

Mehmi said the company achieved an APE (Annualised Premium Equivalent) of Rs 2,204 crore, showing a growth rate of 131 per cent and featuring amongst the fastest-growing life insurance companies in India.

BSLI would foray into health insurance segment in the next few months, he added.

During 2007-08, BSLI revamped its product portfolio and launched four schemes, which have made a significant contribution to APE, Mehmi added.

Rel-Infrastructure buys back shares worth Rs 343.12 cr

Mumbai, May 06: Anil Ambani-led Reliance Infrastructure, formerly known as Reliance Energy, on Tuesday said it has bought back shares worth Rs 343.12 crore since the commencement of buyback offer on March 25.

The firm has so far bought back 26.82 lakh equity shares since the start of the offer, it said in a statement.

Reliance Infrastructure bought back two lakh equity shares today.

Earlier, shareholders of the company had approved the buyback of equity shares up to an aggregate amount of Rs 2,000 crore.

The last date for the buyback is March 4, 2009, a year from the date of the board's approval for the offer.

Shares of the company closed at Rs 1,442.30 at the BSE, down 4.92 per cent from the previous close.

HPL buys L&T`s 51% stake in JV at Rs 180 cr

Kolkata, May 06: Haldia Petrochemicals Limited on Tuesday took over Larsen & Toubro's 51 per cent stake in HPL Cogeneration Limited, a joint venture for captive power unit meant for the petrochemical major, at Rs 180 crore.

"After having worked for nearly 10 years in the joint venture with L&T, HPL is taking over full ownership. With this buyout, HPL will further boost its profitability through operational synergy between HPL and HPLCL," HPL Managing Director S K Bhowmick said here today.

Subsequent to the buyout, HPL has plans to invest in improving energy efficiency by exploring utilisation of alternative feedstock. Bhowmick said the company was contemplating to replace naphtha as a feedstock for the power plant.

HPL has embarked on a 30 per cent capacity expansion to be commissioned by 2008-end. Post expansion the capacity of HPL would go up to 1.7 million tons of petrochemical products.

HPLCL is a profit-making company and posted a profit of Rs 76 crore and a turnover of Rs 133 crore in 2007-08. The paid-up capital of the company was Rs 122 crore.

Bombay HC orders status quo in RIL-RNRL gas supply dispute

Mumbai, May 06: The restraint on Reliance Industries to sell natural gas from its eastern offshore KG-D6 field to third parties will continue till July 22, after the Bombay High Court on Tuesday ordered status quo to be maintained in the case filed by Anil Ambani Group firm RNRL.

A Bombay High Court division bench fixed July 22 as the next date of hearing in the dispute over implementation of a gas supply agreement between Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) and Reliance Natural Resources Ltd (RNRL).

The court had previously asked RIL not to enter into contracts to sell KG-D6 gas with companies other than RNRL and state-run NTPC and asked the two brothers to settle the dispute within four months. But the two sides failed to reach an agreement within the stipulated timeframe.

At the hearing today, RIL counsel Harish Salve argued that the earlier interim order, restraining RIL from selling gas to third party, had lapsed.

He said that RIL would start gas production from KG-D6 by end of July, and requested it be allowed to enter into contracts with third parties for sale of gas.

Drawing from the June 2005 family demerger agreement, RNRL claimed at least half of the 80 million standard cubic meters per day peak production planned from KG-D6 fields.

RNRL lawyer Ram Jethmalani strongly opposed Salve's plea, saying there was a strong possibility of appeals never getting disposed of if RIL was permitted to sign contracts.

Finally, the division bench of justices J N Patel and V M Kanade said that status quo will be maintained till July 22.