High right-of-way charges levied by local bodies for allowing Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd to lay underground cables are largely responsible for the telecom company’s inability to provide land phones on demand, the government said. As of January, BSNL has 12,052 landline applications kept pending and most of this is because of poor commercial feasibility issues […]
The Calcutta High Court has handed over the investigation into the sting operation conducted by ‘Narada News’ to the Central Bureau of Investigation. The agency has been told to complete a preliminary investigation within 72 hours. The move follows complaints that the state police faced a conflict of interest in investigating the tapes, which purportedly […]
Maharashtra, home state of Nitin Gadkari, accounted for 50% of the new highway development projects sanctioned in the ongoing financial year, data from the ministry of road transport and highways showed. A total of 520 new projects — including expansions — worth Rs 53,264 cr was sanctioned by Gadkari’s ministry in the ongoing financial year. […]
Law minister Ravi Shankar Prasad today said the government of India had no plans to force judiciary in the state of Jammu & Kashmir to take their oath of office on the Indian constitution instead of the state constitution. Prasad was responding to a question on why judges of the Jammu & Kashmir High Court take […]
India is planning to increase its nuclear power generation capacity to 44,628 megawatt, about eight times the current capacity of 5,780 MW, the Prime Ministers’ Office said today. At present, India has seven nuclear power plants. However, given that most of these were set up decades ago, most of these facilities contain individual units of […]
The Indian government will continue its talks with Westinghouse Electric Company to set up a nuclear plant in Andhra Pradesh even as the company’s parent, Toshiba Corp, said it would consider selling the unit to Chinese or South Korean companies. “The government has taken note of media reports regarding Toshiba Corporation’s plans to withdraw from […]
Facebook has made a strategic change in the way it facilitates brands, organizations and celebrities interact with their followers on the social network. It has started de-emphasizing ‘likes’ and instead promoting ‘follows’. Unlike competing platforms like Google Plus and Twitter, Facebook has, for years, allowed users to follow a brand or celebrity or organization’s updates only […]
Bank of Baroda said its board of directors had approved the raising of up to Rs 1,000 cr by selling perpetual bonds. The bonds would be sold via private placement, i.e. without a public auction or book building. The timing and other details will be determined by market conditions, the Gujarat-based bank said. Bank of […]
State Bank of India and HDFC Bank were the most successful in attracting and retaining deposits in the wake of demonetization of currency, according to an analysis of their deposits growth so far this financial year. The highest growth was reported by State Bank of India, which added a massive Rs 3.15 lakh cr of […]
Incidents of fraud and theft involving credit and debit cards have fallen sharply in the current financial year, according to data for the first nine months provided by the Reserve Bank of India. While the exact reasons for the sharp decrease is not known, banks in India have been putting in more and more precautions after […]
The demonetization of high-value currency notes saw a rise in the number of bank robberies towards the end of 2016, but all of the increase came from just three states — Jammu & Kashmir, Bihar and Haryana. Overall, cases of theft, robbery and loot of on bank properties increased by 11% in the last three months […]
Reliance Communications, the telecom arm of Anil Ambani Group, has unveiled what is probably India’s cheapest 3G data plan. The company said its subscribers will get 0.5 GB of data every day for 28 days if they recharge with Rs 99. If they are in a non-3G circle, they can recharge with Rs 49 to […]
Anil Ambani’s Reliance Communications Ltd is about to announce a deal under which it will offer 3GB of 4G or 3G data for Rs 149 as well as unlimited on-net calls. It will also announce a competitor to others’ daily limit plans. Its unlimited daily plan will be applicable to 3G users as well. The […]
PayTM, India’s biggest mobile payment company and a minority subsidiary of Alibaba Group, said it partnered with Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur to bring its cashless payment solution to the country’s premier engineering college. Under the program, students will be able to make payments using the mobile app at hostel canteens, medical store, tea stalls, […]
Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd, the state-owned telecommunications operator in the metro areas of Delhi and Mumbai, said it was not aware of any ‘restarting’ of talks related to its merger with Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd, the pan-India telecom operator owned by the public. “We are not aware of any such news. As and when any such […]
The regulator’s new rules on the pricing of television channels in India, which will come into effect in six months, will reduce the clout of big broadcasting companies such as Zee Entertainment Enterprises, Sony, Star India and Sun TV, while encouraging smaller media owners. So far, bigger groups enjoyed a key advantage — they could […]
New rules on the pricing of television channels are likely to make the viewing of HD and sports channels in India cheaper and make charges such as ‘HD Access Fee’ totally illegal. The rules were issued on Friday and will come into effect within six months of it being published in the gazette. The most important […]
Reliance Jio, the telecom operator from Reliance Industries, made a presentation before investors in Mumbai yesterday in which it claimed that it has a headstart of 3-4 years in its core network roll-out compared to rivals and sought to allay concerns on its pricing strategy. The company, which hosted an investor meet in Mumbai yesterday, […]
Vodafone, India’s second largest telecom operator by revenue, has more or less matched newcomer Reliance Jio’s aggressive tariff plan by offering 1 GB per day for one month at Rs 346, in addiition to unlimited voice calling. The plan is almost exactly similar to what Reliance Jio last week, though the pricing — at Rs 346 […]
Private equity and venture capital firms are largely bullish on India in the context of big economic reforms, but are awaiting the results of the ongoing Uttar Pradesh elections to assess the level of popular support that such policies enjoy, according to a survey by VCCircle. VCCircle, which tracks private investment activity in India, said […]
