NEW DELHI, mumbAi, beNGALuru, kOLkAtA, cHeNNAi, AHmedAbAd, HyderAbAd, cHANdiGArH*, PuNe* VOL. 17 NO.

231

Thursday, September 28, 2023

Cipla in advanced talks with Diamond industry grapples

livemint.com two groups to sell stake uP1 with major demand slumpuP1
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 NEW DELHI, mumbAi, beNGALuru, kOLkAtA, cHeNNAi, AHmedAbAd, HyderAbAd, cHANdiGArH*, PuNe* VOL. 17 NO. 231

Thursday, September 28, 2023

India wants WTO rules on Byju’s puts campus

livemint.com foodgrain scrapped uP1 placements on hold uP6
 ThurSDay, 28 SepTember 2023
New Delhi
LIVEMINT.COM

No. 225/2/2020-Wind
Government of India
Ministry of New and Renewable Energy
Atal Akshya Urja Bhawan, Opp. CGO Complex,
Lodhi Road, New Delhi-110003
Public Notice
Tender for allocation of seabed for development of Offshore Wind
Energy Projects

Follow the
The Ministry of New & Renewable Energy propose to hold bids for the
allocation of offshore wind sites off the coast of Tamil Nadu through
its nodal agency ‘National Institute of Wind Energy (NIWE)’ for the
development of offshore wind energy projects for sale of power under
Open Access Mode/Third Party Sale/sale through Power Exchanges
or for captive consumption. The identified sites are given in the map
annexed. The details of selected sites for bidding out along with timeline

channel on WhatsApp
are given as under;
Zone Site No. as Date/Year Area Approximate Capacities
shown in of issuance (Km²) (MW)
map of bid @ 5.0 MW/Km²
B 2 01.02.2024 203 1015
3 209 1045
4 208 1040
7 208 1040
E&G 5 FY 2024-25 207 1035
6 204 1020

Stay updated with breaking news,

8 204 1020
Total 07 sites 1443 7215
Facilitation from Government for the above projects:

Applicable required Stage-I and Stage-II clearances as per National

trending stories and more!

Offshore Wind Energy Policy- 2015 from various Central/State
Ministries/Departments shall be facilitated by NIWE.

The grid evacuation infrastructure up to the offshore substation
(including the offshore substation) shall be provided as part of ISTS
network by CTU/PGCIL. [Refer fig 2 of Annex]

Offshore wind power projects commissioned on or before 31st
December, 2032 will be eligible for waiver of ISTS charges and
Additional Surcharge for the power from offshore wind power
projects. [Refer MoP Order No. 12/07/2023 - NCM and MoP
Notification G.S.R. 381(E)]

Concessional Custom Duty on import of critical components for
manufacturing of offshore wind turbines is proposed to be extended
for offshore wind manufacturing similar to the presently available
onshore wind turbines.

Renewable Energy Credits with Multipliers, Carbon Credit benefits
are also proposed for offshore wind projects.
Salient Features of the Proposed Bid to Allocate Site:

The bid will be on the basis of single stage two envelope wherein
the first envelope will be the techno-commercial bid and second
envelope will be the financial bid wherein the bidder quotes the site
lease rental with a minimum floor price @ Rs. 1 Lakh/sq km/year.

The leasing of the seabed area to the developer will initially be for
the period of 05 years extendable by further 01 years on case to
case basis. The developer has to commission the offshore wind
energy project(s) including conducting required studies/surveys
within this time period.

The developer may exit from the project development during these
5 years of lease period subject to;
 Submission of the study/survey data to NIWE.
 Forfeiture of the submitted Bank Guarantee which will be USD
1 million for a site.

NIWE will monitor the activities/progress of project development
during the above period of lease.

The site allocation fee paid by developer up to project commissioning
over and above the floor price would partially returned to the
developer, if developer commission the project within scheduled
commissioning date.

Post commissioning of the project the lease will be extended for the
operational life of the project and decommissioning period.

The project developer shall pay the seabed lease floor price
@ Rs. 1 Lakh/sq km/year (lease rentals) for the remaining
operation period from the date of commissioning.
In order to have necessary preparedness towards participating in the
above bids for allocation of offshore wind sites, interested developers
may carry out their own required study/survey on these sites after
informing NIWE. NIWE will extend all the support to facilitate the study/
survey activities as per the Guidelines for Wind Power Assessment,
Studies and Surveys.
For more details ‘Strategy for Establishment of Offshore Wind Energy
Projects’ available at https://mnre.gov.in/ may be referred.
Annex
Fig 1: Proposed Sites for Offshore Wind Projects off the coast off
Tamil Nadu

Fig 2: Proposed Sites for Offshore Wind Projects off the coast off
Tamil Nadu

CBC 28101/11/0012/2324
 NEW DELHI, MuMBAI, BENGALuRu, kOLkATA, CHENNAI, AHMEDABAD, HYDERABAD, CHANDIGARH*, puNE*
Thursday, September 28, 2023
Think Ahead. Think Growth.
mint primer
Govt borrowing:
What it means
for the economy
BY RHIK KUNDU
The central government on Tuesday announced that it will borrow
₹6.55 trillion during the second half of the ongoing fiscal year,
keeping its borrowing plans unchanged. Mint explains the relevance
of this for the Indian economy.
What’s the govt’s How did the market
1 borrowing plan?
The central government will
2 react to this?
Breaching the borrowing plan
borrow ₹6.55 trillion during the would have impacted the markets
second half of the ongoing and bond yields. Sticking to the
financial year, which comprises borrowing plan demonstrates
42.45% of its gross market fiscal prudence. This has a calming
borrowing of ₹15.43 trillion for the effect and reduces pressure on the
full year. The borrowing for FY24 markets. This also indicates that
will be done through dated there will be enough liquidity
securities. The borrowing in the available in the markets, though at
second half of the year will be present there’s no shortfall of
completed through 20 weekly liquidity. The government’s
auctions, spread over 3, 5, 7, 10, 14, 10-year bond yield was trading at
30, 40 and 50-year securities, with 7.17% on Wednesday, up from 7.14%
different shares. The Centre often on Tuesday. According to some
front-loads its capital expenditure economists, while the government
plans, which means borrowing is unlikely to breach its borrowing
more during the first half of the
year, to maintain growth
outlook, its market borrowing
could end up being lower than the
momentum. budgeted amount.
3 What other options does
the government have?
The Centre can dip into small savings
funds, like the National Small Saving Fund
(NSSF), Senior Citizen Saving Scheme, etc.,
which have seen a surge in net collections.
These collections have grown over 48% in
Q1FY24, compared to the year-ago period.
The increase in the net collections of small
savings can help the Centre reduce its
dependence on the markets.
4 How will the fiscal
deficit be impacted?
The Centre aims to stick to a fiscal
5 Has government
borrowing increased?
The Centre’s borrowing has
deficit target of 5.9% of GDP on increased from about ₹7 trillion in
the back of robust tax and non-tax FY20 to about ₹15 trillion in the
collections, as well as the expected ongoing fiscal, as it shores up its
higher dividends from the Reserve capital expenditure to push for
Bank of India and public sector growth often in the absence of a
banks (due to higher interest rates boom in private capital. However,
as compared to the last fiscal). this hasn’t impacted government
Though the government is bond yields as these borrowings
unlikely to reach its divestment have been done in a structured
target for FY24, which stands at way, showcasing fiscal prudence
₹51,000 crore, it has no plans to and discipline. During the last few
curtail its capex programme as any years, the government hasn’t
shortfall from disinvestment breached its borrowing targets,
proceeds will be made up from even during the pandemic, which
higher dividends. has helped market sentiments.
MINT PODCASTS
THE FINTECH ODYSSEY THE TAX CONTROVERSY
Unveiling India’s Fintech Future: Explore the world of gambling firms
Challenges and Solutions. Join Ritesh and the controversy surrounding tax
Verma, head of levies to the tune of
business, Solutions thousands of crores
Group, Newgen, of rupees by the
and Sunil Pandita, Directorate General
head of sales (India of GST Intelligence.
and South Asia) at The gaming indus-
Newgen, as they try is questioning
discuss the path forward in this epi- the legality of retrospective tax
sode of Mint Techcetra podcast. Lis- claims. Tune in for a deeper dive into
ten now! this debate. Listen now!
VOL. 17 NO. 231
QUICK EDIT
Gaps we
must close
Public lynchings in India may
be isolated cases, but each
instance tarnishes the country’s
rule-of-law credentials. This
week, a man suspected of theft
died after he was tied to a pole in
northeast Delhi and beaten with
sticks, a ghastly violation of his
legal rights that was captured by
a video clip in circulation on
social media. In August, home
demolitions in Haryana’s Nuh
town had to be halted by the
high court in Chandigarh for
not following the process of law
laid down for such action. Ear-
lier, Uttar Pradesh had acquired
a reputation for encounter kill-
ings by police forces that gave
alleged criminals no chance of a
judicial-system defence. What-
ever the circumstances, news
reports of this kind do not help
India’s case globally when our
representatives aver that extra-
judicial punishment is not the
country’s policy. Indeed, it is
not. India is a constitutional
democracy that accords every-
one a right to be heard in court
and insists on proof for pro-
nouncements of guilt. However,
gaps persist between what the
law requires and what some-
times happens on the ground.
Instead of being distracted by
relativist arguments of what
people may or may not deserve,
let’s close those glaring gaps.
MINT METRIC
by Bibek Debroy
Diamonds lost on a road by mistake,
A message outright fake.
Taken in by the prank,
People searched and drew a blank.
In Surat, some slow on the uptake.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
If we are to transit from the
middle income trap, the private
sector needs to enhance its
contribution to R&D through
its own investments and
under corporate social
responsibility
SUMAN BERY
VICE-CHAIRMAN,
NITI AAYOG
AI IN HEALTHCARE
Join Dr. Raheel Sayeed, an expert in
personalized digital health, as he
unravels the impact
of Generative AI in
healthcare, from
Electronic Health-
care Records to
Ayushman Bharat
Digital Mission.
With hosts Leslie D’Monte and Jay-
anth N Kolla, discover how AI is trans-
forming patient care. Listen now.
 PLAIN FACTS

FPIs go on selling spree

in Sep: What lies ahead
BY NITI KIRAN

I
ndian equities had a tumultuous ride last week after the US Federal Reserve indicated that it could keep interest rates ele-
vated for longer than expected before. The Fed projections pushed the US Treasury yields to a 16-year peak and lifted the
dollar index. In response, foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) have turned sellers in Indian equities in September so far, after
months of investing heavily. The ongoing India-Canada tiff, rising crude oil prices, and erratic rainfall have also dampened
investors’ sentiments. Market analysts believe that uncertain global cues and the sharp surge in US bond yields will keep
sentiments on the edge in the near term.

Flight to safety
Until August, FPIs had remained net buyers of Indian equities for six months. But this month so far, they have offloaded
shares worth over ₹10,000 crore as US bonds, with their rising yields, have become a more lucrative option. Between April
and August, foreign investors had significantly pumped money in segments such as financial services, capital goods and
auto. But with the sudden withdrawal, metals and mining, power, and services quickly fell out of favour.
Net foreign portfolio investments in Indian equities, in ₹ crore
50,000

40,000

30,000

20,000

10,000
Jan 2023 Sep 2023
0

-10,000
-12,716
-20,000

-30,000
Data till 26 September Source: NSDL

Cumulative net equity investments by FPIs Cumulative net equity investments by FPIs
in Apr-Aug 2023, in ₹ crore during 1-15 Sep 2023, in ₹ crore
Top 5 Top 5
Financial services 47,735 Financial services 6,410
Capital goods 23,913 Capital goods 3,569
Automobile and auto components 20,692 Consumer services 1,675
Power 17,028 Information technology 1,438
Healthcare 8,435 Realty 789
Bottom 5 Bottom 5
Metals & mining -3,886 Metals & mining -4,556
Information technology -3,713 Power -4,153
Services -1,403 Services -3,706
Media, entertainment & publications -738 Oil, gas and consumable fuels -2,687
Forest materials -80 Telecommunication -1,204
Source: CMIE

Peers under pressure Destination India

But FPIs have been selling across emerging markets (EMs), Notwithstanding the recent pangs, over 100 new foreign
and analysts expect this to continue for some more time. investors entered the Indian stock markets since March.
What’s going well for India is that despite the risk-off selling Over 400 new FPIs had joined the capital markets last fiscal
spree, flows into the country have remained healthy for the year—with the highest number coming from the US—com-
year so far, cumulatively, relative to peer markets. Domestic pared to 633 in 2021-22. In terms of the equity assets under
institutional investors are standing tall with sustained buying, custody, Canada was at the ninth spot as of August, with a
as domestic mutual fund inflows have stayed robust. 2.8% share. The ongoing tensions between India and
Year-to-date net equity investments by FPIs ($ million) Canada are unlikely to impact these flows. Nearly 84% of
the overseas investors’ equity assets under custody are
India 14,921 from 10 countries, with the US having a 42% share.
South Korea 6,334.3 Number of foreign portfolio investors
12,000 11,081
Brazil 2,076
10,000
Sri Lanka 10.1
8,000
Indonesia -203.2
6,000
Vietnam -271.4
4,000
Malaysia -451.1
2,000
Philippines -824.9
0
Taiwan -1,776.8 2014-15 2022-23
Thailand -4,516.4 The figures are as of 31 March of every year. Source: Sebi

Data for India, Philippines, South Korea, and Taiwan till 26 September; Malaysia,
Indonesia, Vietnam and Sri Lanka till 25 September; Brazil till 21 September. Share (%) of top 10 countries in FPIs' total
Source: Bloomberg equity assets under custody
Domestic institutional investors' net equity investments (₹ crore) US 41.9
35,000 -
Luxembourg 7.3
30,000
Singapore 7.3
25,000
Mauritius 5.9
20,000
UK 5.3
15,000
Ireland 5.1
10,000
Norway 3.2
5,000
France 2.9
0
Canada 2.8
-5,000
Jan 2023 Sep 2023 Japan 2.3
Data till 25 September Source: CMIE Data as of August 2023 Source: NSDL

Lost holdings? What lies ahead?

Meanwhile, FPI ownership in the top 500 listed firms had risen to a
seven-quarter high in the April-June period in value terms. With the India is better placed
reversal of flows, shareholding of foreign investors in these compa- compared to its other
nies would most likely have seen some decline in the current quarter. emerging market peers.
Data for this will get updated only by the end of next month. Other EMs like China,
23 FPI ownership by value (%) in top 500 firms, quarterly Taiwan etc. are
suffering from their
22.5
own issues and that
22 might be a gain for
21.6 India. By and large, we believe that FPIs
21.5
cannot ignore India in their allocations. There
21 may be temporary outflow due to
20.5 temporary issues but India will continue to
20
attract FPI money on a long-term basis.
Jun 2021 Jun 2023 MUKESH KOCHAR
Analysis based on 487 companies of BSE 500 index. Source: Capitaline, Mint calculations National head - wealth, AUM Capital
PARAS JAIN/MINT

PEANUTS by Charles M. Schulz

 NEw DELHI, MUMbAI, bENGALURU, KOLKATA, CHENNAI, AHMEDAbAD, HYDERAbAD, CHANDIGARH*, PUNE*
Thursday, September 28, 2023
SENSEX 66,118.69 173.22
Cipla in advanced
talks with 2 groups
Promoters in talks with consortiums led by Torrent and Baring
Anirudh Laskar & Sneha Shah
anirudh.l@htlive.com
MUMbAI
C
ipla Ltd’s promoters
are in advanced talks
with two consorti-
ums—one led by Tor-
rent Pharmaceuticals
Ltd, with the participation of prom-
inent family offices, and the other a
group of buyout firms led by BPEA
EQT and General Atlantic—to sell a
controlling stake in India’s fourth-
largest drugmaker for $6-7 billion,
two people with direct knowledge
of the matter said.
The consortium led by Torrent
Pharma is backed by its promoters,
the Mehta family, alongside invest-
ments from entities linked to Dilip
Shanghvi-led Sun Pharmaceutical
Industries Ltd and the Patel family-
owned Zydus Lifesciences Ltd.
A successful bid by Torrent
Pharma would propel the company
into the second-biggest Indian
drugmaker after Sun Pharma.
Cipla’s promoter group, led by its
founder’s son Yusuf K. Hamied, 87,
is seeking a valuation of at least
₹33,000 crore for its 33.47% stake
and will only cede control if binding
bids value the drugmaker at ₹1 tril-
lion, according to one of the two
people.
livemint.com
NIFTY 19,716.45 51.75
ON THE bLOCK
Cipla’s promoters are looking to sell a controlling stake in India’s
fourth-largest drugmaker for $6-7 billion.
India's largest pharma deal in the making
Cipla's market cap
₹95,304 cr
Cipla’s promoter Promoter
group is seeking over stake
33.47%
₹33,000 cr
for its stake
Likely size of Cipla
promoter exit deal
$6-7 bn
If Torrent Pharma wins the bid,
the combined entity would be
India's second-largest
pharma firm in terms of revenue
BUYOUT MODE
CIPLA’S promoters ANy change in
want a price of a little promoter control will
over ₹1,200 per share trigger an open offer
“The latest discussions with Cipla
promoters’ bankers regarding valu-
ations and the premium to market
price happened on Friday,” said the
first person, who added that Cipla’s
promoters want a price of a little
over ₹1,200 per share. Cipla’s shares
ended trading at ₹1,180.50 on
Wednesday, valuing the company
DOLLAR ₹83.23
SALE necessitated by
succession issues, say
investment bankers
at ₹95,300 crore.
Any change in promoter control
will also trigger a mandatory open
offer, requiring the buyer to offer to
acquire as much as 26% from Cipla’s
shareholders.
“The total amount required for
TURN TO PAGE 6
VOL. 17 NO. 231
The shifting sands of
food prices
₹0.01 EURO ₹87.90
Diamond industry
grapples with major
slump in demand
Ram Sahgal &
Ravi Dutta Mishra
ram.sahgal@livemint.com
MUMbAI/NEW DELHI
I
ndia’s diamond cutting and
polishing trade is facing an
unprecedented crisis amid
falling demand, prompting
trade bodies to ask members to
halt the imports of rough
stones for two months.
This is the “worst-ever
demand crisis,” said Anoop
Vrajlal Mehta, president of
Bharat Diamond Bourse
(BDB), India’s hub of diamond
trading with the rest of the
world. This is just the fifth time
since the 1970s that trade asso-
ciations have made such an
appeal to members to halt
imports.
The country cuts and pol-
ishes nine out of 10 of the
world’s rough diamonds, pro-
viding employment to two
million Indians. So far this
financial year, exports are
down 30.27% from a year ago
to $7.03 billion, the worst fall
in at least five years.
Demand has collapsed in
China, which is battling an
economic slowdown after a
property bubble burst. In the
US, another key market, con-
sumers are shunning luxury
Rs. 10.00 . Price with Hindustan Times Rs. 15.50
₹0.33 OIL $94.08
I
Nine out of 10 of the world’s
rough diamonds are cut and
polished in India. MINT
goods amid high inflation
fuelled by an easy monetary
policy during the pandemic.
China accounts for 13% of pol-
ished diamond exports from
India and the US 45-48%.
“Polished diamond prices
have fallen by 15-20% from a
year ago,” said Mehta, who is
also chairman and managing
director of Mohit Diamonds,
one of the 38 Indian sighthold-
ers of De Beers. Sightholders
are companies authorized by
De Beers to buy rough dia-
monds.
What’s worrying is that the
fall in demand seems to be
structural, with prices for natu-
ral diamonds (as opposed to lab-
TURN TO PAGE 6
Meta works to comply with
uP10 India’s data protection Act uP6
$0.72
India wants
WTO rules
on foodgrain
scrapped
Ravi Dutt & Puja Das
ravi.dutt@livemint.com
NEW DELHI
ndia will seek the removal of
entitlements in trading
rules that have helped
developed countries dominate
global farm exports and
obstructed developing coun-
tries’ fair access to export mar-
kets, a person aware of the
development said.
At the next World Trade
Organization (WTO) inter-
ministerial meeting in Abu
Dhabi, India will seek the
removal of ‘additional Final
Bound Total Aggregate Meas-
urement of Support (FBTAMS)
entitlements’. These are fixed
additional allowances over the
‘de minimis limits’ under the
rules of the WTO Agreement
on Agriculture (AoA).
In trade parlance, ‘de mini-
mis limits’ are the minimal
amount of domestic support
that is allowed a country even
though it distorts global pri-
ces. These have been set at 5%
of the value of production for
developed countries and 10%
for developing nations.
This has been a matter of
considerable friction over the
years, most recently when
New Delhi had to defend its
TURN TO PAGE 6
20 PAGES
GOLD ₹58,263 ₹439
DON’T MISS
DGCA can act against pilots
not serving notice: Delhi HC
Akasa Air, India’s newest airline, on
Wednesday got partial relief from the high
courts of Delhi and Mumbai in cases
involving pilots leaving the airline without
completing the mandatory six-month
notice period. >P7
Pre-poll budget meetings to
weigh food, fertilizer sops
The finance ministry will hold as many as 65
meetings with various ministries and
departments within a span of a month
starting in October to finalize the revised
budget estimates for FY24 and the FY25
budget numbers. >P2
GST from October on imported
online services for personal use
From 1 October, imports of online services for
personal use from offshore digital services
companies such as software sellers, content
streaming platforms, social media firms and
search engines hosting advertisements will be
subject to 18% IGST. >P2
Kerala floods movie 2018 is
India’s official Oscars entry
Survival drama 2018: Everyone is a Hero,
based on the Kerala floods that year, is
India’s official entry to the 96th Academy
Awards, which is scheduled to be held on 10
March 2024, the Film Federation of India
announced on Wednesday. >P9
02 ThurSDay, 28 SepTember 2023
New Delhi ECONOMY & POLICY LIVEMINT.COM

m MINT SHORTS
‘No tax tweaks to aid Indian bond
Pre-poll budget meetings to Govt to
restrict 2
inclusion on global indices’
New Delhi: India is not planning any changes to its tax regime
to help Indian government bonds be included on other global
indices, a government source said on Wednesday. JPMorgan’s
weigh food, fertilizer sops influenza
drug sales
decision last week to include India in its emerging market bond
index from June 2024 is likely to bring in around $25 billion, as Priyanka Sharma
per analysts’ estimates. REUTERS priyanka.sharma@livemint.com
Finance ministry will hold as many as 65 meetings between 10 October and 14 November NEW DELHI

XBB sub-variants accounted for

T
he health ministry plans
Puja Das & Gireesh Chandra Prasad economist and executive vice president to bring two flu drugs,
75% of covid cases: Insacog NEW DELHI at HDFC Bank. Oseltamivir and Zana-
PTI
“However, the trend of improving mivir, under schedule H1 of

T
he finance ministry will the expenditure mix, particularly the drugs and cosmetic law to
hold a series of meetings higher spending on infrastructure will ensure they are not sold with-
with various ministries and continue.” out a doctor’s prescription
departments starting early Figures for FY25 are likely to get because of the potential of
October to finalize the revised in the full-year budget to be misuse.
revised budget estimates for FY24 and presented by the government after the The move also makes it
the FY25 budget numbers with a pre- general elections next year. mandatory for chemists to
election focus on balancing a possible The government had budgeted ₹ maintain a record of sale and
rise in subsidy requirements with the 1.97 trillion for food subsidy and purchase of these drugs. The
need to maintain fiscal prudence. ₹1.75 trillion for fertilizer subsidy for government has sought com-
As many as 65 meetings will be held FY24. ments from stakeholders
within a span of a month, a person Upto the end of July, it had spent within one month to move
New Delhi: There’s 25% prevalence of recombinant variant informed about the official schedule of ₹68,494 crore on food subsidy, about a ahead with this decision.
XBB.1.16 of the covid-19 virus in different parts of India, consultations said. third of the full-year allocation. This is A notification issued by the
according to the latest bulletin of the Indian SARS-CoV-2 The extensive consultations from 10 slightly more than what was spent in health ministry proposes to
Genomics Consortium (Insacog). However, XBB sub-linea- October to 14 November will assess the A key focus of the pre-election meetings will be balancing the possible rise in the same period a year ago. amend the drugs rules in con-
ges account for 75% of the current infection with no severity spending pattern so far this year, tax subsidy requirements with the need for maintaining fiscal prudence. HT In the case of fertilizers, ₹72,035 sultation with the Drugs Tech-
seen in cases. Besides, the public health risk of newly detected collection growth against the nominal crore has been spent upto July, nical Advisory Board to incor-
variant EG.5 was low worldwide, it said. PRIYANKA SHARMA gross domestic product (GDP) growth affairs and petroleum and natural gas calendar for FY24. Some of the meet- accounting for 41% of the full-year allo- porate Oseltamivir and Zana-
and any extra spending needed this fis- ministry among others in October. ings will be chaired by finance secre- cation, as per data available with the mivir drugs under schedule
cal year—especially for food and fertil- Discussions with the fertilizer tary T V Somanathan and some by the Controller General of Accounts. H1. “These two drugs are anti-
ONGC, NTPC Green tie-up for izer subsidies, considering that they department, food ministry and agricul- additional secretary handling budget in Some experts pointed out that higher virals and can be used for all
have been higher than last year ture ministry will be held in the department of economic subsidy pay-outs for fertilizers, kinds of viral infections. But
domestic, global RE projects in both absolute terms and as November, the person cited affairs. cooking gas and a likely rise these drugs are largely used for
New Delhi: State-run Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) a share of the total budget above said on condition of An email sent to the in the allocation for rural the treatment of influenza,
on Tuesday inked a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with
NTPC Green Energy Limited to develop renewable energy pro-
allocation for the full year.
The meetings are ₹68,494 cr anonymity. finance ministry on
Given that it would be Wednesday seeking
jobs scheme MGNREGA
cr could take up the Cen- ₹72,035 H1N1 (swine flu) etc. However,
it has also shown sensitivity
jects. A statement by ONGC said the MoU will primarily explore expected to start with the spent on food a pre-election budget, comments for the story spent by Jul tre’s spending. towards Nipah virus infection.
the feasibility and setting up of renewable energy projects in vari- ministry of new and subsidy till Jul for the political executive’s remained unanswered at on fertilizer The government had Hence, the government plans
ous domains. STAFF WRITER renewable energy, and FY24 appetite for new ideas to the time of publishing. subsidy collected ₹8.65 trillion in to bring Oseltamivir and Zana-
the department of north be weaved into the budget Experts said that fiscal direct taxes up to 16 Sep- mivir under strict vigilance,”
eastern region and statistics is expected to be high. credibility will remain a pri- tember after accounting for said the state drug controller
‘Digitally skilled youth can and programme implementation However, on Tuesday, the ority for the government. “The tax refunds, meeting a little more requesting anonymity. “Now,
on 10 October. finance ministry chose to send a clear government is unlikely to resort to than half of the full-year target. Goods all pharmacies will have to
harness potential of tech’ These will be followed by discus- signal to the market that it will stick to populist measures despite impending and Services Tax receipts too have been maintain a register for a record
HT
sions with the ministries of rural devel- its market borrowing plan, when it elections and fiscal consolidation will robust so far. of sale and purchase of these
opment, power, housing and urban announced the second half borrowing be central,” said Abheek Barua, chief puja.das@livemint.com drugs,” the official said.

India, Philippines go Singapore may get more rice from India

slow on BIT push Puja Das
puja.das@livemint.com
whichever is earlier,” another
official said. “The government
NEW DELHI noted that any extension of
Shashank Mattoo had a round of talks virtually such measure beyond this

I
New Delhi: Digitally skilled youth can harness the poten- shashank.mattoo@livemint.com where they exchanged their ndia may allow exports of period would adversely impact
tial of technology to become entrepreneurs and wealth cre- NEW DELHI templates for an investment another 50,000 tonnes of the interests of farmers.”
ators, minister for education and skill development and agreement. non-basmati white rice to However, agronomists see

A
entrepreneurship Dharmendra Pradhan said on Wednes- push by India and the However, those talks did not Singapore under humanitarian lower rice production despite
day. Pradhan, who presided over the signing of eight mem- Philippines to renego- make much progress and mat- operations, making an excep- higher paddy acreage. This is
orandums of understanding with IBM on digital skilling tiate their investment ters have progressed little tion for one of its key diplo- ascribed to yield loss due to the
and skilling in emerging technologies, said that with its vast agreement is moving slowly, since. matic partners, two govern- uneven distribution of rainfall
and youthful population, India stands at the cusp of tre- according to persons aware of Queries mailed to the minis- ment officials said. in the four-month southwest
mendous potential. STAFF WRITER the matter. tries of external affairs and India recently permitted monsoon season. This may
The agreement, which was commerce were not answered limited exports of the rice vari- ultimately push up prices
signed in 2000 and came into by press time. ety, which is currently under beginning the next season.
AFSPA extended in Manipur hills force in 2001, expired in 2011. Indian investments in the the prohibited category, to the “While southern and central
New Delhi has called for the Philippines are valued at UAE and last month to Bhutan, Exports of another 50,000 tonnes of non-basmati white rice to states report no impact on
for 6 months, valley areas kept out agreement to be around $900 mil- Mauritius and Singapore. Singapore under humanitarian operations may be cleared. ISTOCK yields, in Uttar Pradesh and
Imphal: The Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act or AFSPA terminated and Indian lion. Bilateral These countries appealed to Bihar, patchy rainfall in August
was extended by another six months in Manipur on Wednes- replaced by a new investments trade stands at New Delhi to resume rice including rice. “The second In view of low pipeline stocks is estimated to have led to poor
day barring 19 police stations falling under the Imphal valley Bilateral Invest- in the around $3 billion exports following India’s deci- tranche of rice may also be and high exports, rice prices tillering which may have a mar-
and an area that shares its boundary with neighbouring ment Treaty Philippines in 2022-23. sion to suspend non-basmati exported through the National were rising. However, in the ginal impact on yields,” said
Assam. An official notification said the state government is of (BIT). India is negoti- shipments on 20 July to keep Cooperative Exports Ltd,” one coming year, Kharif rice pro- Pushan Sharma, director -
are valued at
the opinion after analysing the prevailing law and order situa- The negotia- ating investment prices in check. of the officials said. duction is expected to be research, CRISIL Market Intel-
tion that it is not expedient to have detailed assessment on the tions were around treaties alongside In August, Singapore India up to 17 bumper due to a ligence and Analytics.
ground as security agencies are preoccupied in maintenance delayed by the $900 million free trade agree- requested around 110,000 ton- August in the cur- The second 10.8% increase “Considering the sowing and
of law and order. PTI covid-19 pan- ments with sev- nes of non-basmati white rice, rent financial year shipment of rice year-on-year in yield situation and market con-
demic. According eral of its trading following which India allowed had exported 1.97 may also be paddy area to 41.2 ditions, we expect paddy prices
to persons cited above, both partners, including the UK and exports of 50,000 tonnes. The million tonnes of exported through million hectares. to remain elevated on-year,”
No timeline for finalizing report on sides also discussed kicking off EU, that are looking for UN World Food Programme non-basmati
the National This may improve said Sharma.UP, Bihar, West
the talks in June during a stronger investment protec- also sought 200,000 tonnes of white rice com- domestic availa- Bengal and Jharkhand -- key
synchronized polls: Panel chief meeting between foreign min- tion than afforded by the 2016 Indian rice for its humanitarian pared to 1.89 mt Cooperative bility from Octo- rice-producing states --
New Delhi: Work is still continuing on the issue of simultaneous isters S. Jaishankar and model BIT.The government operations amid what it called during the corre- Exports Ltd ber when rice har- received deficient rainfall
polls and no timeline has been given for finalizing a report on it, Enrique Manalo. annulled BITs based on texts “catastrophic levels“ of global sponding period vesting starts. throughout the June-Septem-
Law Commission Chairman Justice Ritu Raj Awasthi said on Those talks also saw framed back in 1993 after food insecurity, triggered by last year. Total “Therefore, the ber monsoon season.
Wednesday. “Still some work is going on on simultaneous elec- progress on signing a prefer- receiving adverse judgments the pandemic and the Ukraine rice exports, barring broken government had decided to Queries sent to the com-
tions. We have not finalized the report. There is no timeline for ential trade agreement (PTA). in multi-billion dollar inves- war. Bangladesh is also in talks rice, export of which is prohib- keep this trade measure in merce and food & public distri-
finalizing it,” Justice (retd) Awasthi, who was the chief justice of After the meeting, the two tor-state disputes in interna- with India for supplies of some ited, were 7.33 mt compared to place until September or the bution ministries remained
the Karnataka High Court, told reporters. PTI sides are understood to have tional courts. agricultural commodities, 6.37 mt in the same period. arrival of the next rice crop, unanswered at press time.

India to iron out rupee trade problems amid stranded Russian assets CORRECTIONS AND
CLARIFICATIONS
Mint welcomes comments,
Rhik Kundu currency, which is held by one jects and investments, trea- Both officials spoke under Russia has increased substan- suggestions or complaints
rhik.kundu@livemint.com bank on behalf of another. By sury bills and government the condition of anonymity. tially over the last year. about errors.
NEW DELHI utilizing the respondent securities. A finance ministry spokes- India imported crude worth
Readers can alert the
bank’s local banking infra- Despite the challenges, Rus- person didn’t respond to $31 billion from Russia in
newsroom to any errors in the

I
ndia is working with Russia
to sort out lingering prob-
lems with the rupee trade
mechanism, including chal-
lenges with the exchange rate
mechanism and fund repatria-
tion, two government officials
said.
“Though issues with the
special Rupee Vostro account
system haven’t yet been
resolved, both sides are work-
ing on the teething issues,”
one of the officials said.
A Vostro account is a bank
account, generally in a foreign
structure, it enables the bank
to offer services to its clients in
overseas markets.
In July 2022, amid western
sanctions on Russia, the
Reserve Bank of India (RBI)
announced this mechanism to
allow local traders to settle
imports and exports in rupees.
Mint reported on 9 August
that Russian funds worth
about $10-12 billion are esti-
mated to have been invested in
Indian government treasury
bills in the year ended 31
March 2023, after a surge in
sia remains committed to the
rupee-trade mechanism and is
unlikely to unilaterally pull out
of it, another senior govern-
ment official said.
“The Russians will not uni-
laterally pull out from this
arrangement,” said the second
In July 2022, RBI had announced the mechanism for local traders official cited above.
to settle imports and exports in rupees. MINT “Any pull-out, if it ever hap-
pens, will take place after
trade deficit led to higher sur- with huge surpluses in their agreements between both
pluses in the vostro accounts. vostro accounts in India. sides,” the person added with-
India’s had a $43 billion RBI allows excess balance out mentioning the quantum
trade deficit with Russia, from such accounts to be of transactions under this
which left Russian exporters invested in payments for pro- mechanism.
emailed queries.
As things stand, the US dol-
lar remains the preferred cur-
rency for trade.
However, promoting trade
denominated in rupees allows
Indian traders to cut currency
conversion costs.
India has allowed banks in
22 partner-countries, includ-
ing Bangladesh, Germany,
Israel, Russia, Sri Lanka and
the UK, to open ‘vostro’
accounts in the country, Reu-
ters reported in August.
India’s import of oil from
FY23, as against $2.5 billion in paper by emailing us, with your
the previous year and $900 full name and address to
million in FY21, according to feedback@livemint.com.
government data.
This has led to the widening It is our policy to promptly
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A Bloomberg report in June asktheeditor@livemint.com
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LIVEMINT.COM DEALS, TECH & STARTUPS ThurSDay, 28 SepTember 2023
New Delhi 03

m MINT SHORTS
QuriousBit gets seed funding from
‘We are hoping to double
Lumikai, General Catalyst
Bengaluru: Gaming startup QuriousBit has secured $2 million
(₹16.64 crore) in a seed funding round led by Lumikai, with partici-
pation from General Catalyst. The Bengaluru-based company will
capacity to 2.4GW by 2025’
use the funds to strengthen its team. Founded by Ramakrishna Aman Malik can provide, as we are an industrial
Reddy Y. L., and Shubham Joshi, QuriousBit builds casual puzzle aman.malik@livemint.com player and not a financial player. Our
games for mobile platforms. It aims to build a personalized gaming New DeLHi strengths are on the utility side, in
experience. “We see an opportunity in casual puzzle games developing projects, and in building

F
beyond match-3 and blast genres. Some of these genres have rench energy company Engie and operating them. So, somebody
potential with innovative core gameplay mechanics and deeper has been looking to expand its with a complementary skill set in terms
narratives,” said Reddy. Indian renewables business, of better financing, better leverage, The matching game has been
albeit at a more conservative more financial engineering, those downloaded 5 bn times. REUTERS
pace than many of its peers in kinds of things will be the right fit.
PierSight secures $600K funding
from All In Capital, others
the South Asian country. The company
sold a majority stake in its operational
Engie began sharpening its focus
on India in 2019 even as it decided Candy
solar assets to a fund managed by Edel- to pull out of 20 other countries.
ISTOCK
weiss in early 2020 and is now again
looking for partners to more than dou-
What was the rationale behind
focusing on India? Has the gamble
Crush Saga
ble its capacity in India over the next
couple of years.
In an interview with VCCircle, Engie
paid off?
We have been in India for quite a
while now, since we acquired Solaire-
hits $20 bn
India managing director Amit Jain talks
about the process of finalising a new
direct in 2015. We have seen the entire
renewable space evolve. The first revenue
partnership model and searching for a project, in fact, was commissioned in
new partner in India. He also speaks
about Engie’s projects, capacity expan-
2014, if you go back to Solairedirect. So,
we see what works and what does not.
milestone
sion plans and the challenges the com- Being French, we take a very con-
pany faces. Edited excerpts: servative view. We want to make our Reuters
foundation strong. That is what we did feedback@livemint.com
Engie India is over the past years; we became more LONDON
Bengaluru: Ocean surveillance-based deeptech startup raising $200 mil- local. Earlier, we had a small team of

C
PierSight has raised $600,000 (₹4.99 crore) in a pre-seed lion from AIIB four-five business developers. Now, we andy Crush Saga, the
funding round led by early-stage investor All In Capital. The and ADB for its Gujarat project. backers is Engie likely to raise models we want in India. It is under dis- have a full-fledged engineering office matching game
round also saw participation from Techstars and angel inves- Could you give more details? funding for future projects? Is cussion at the group level. We will have and about 100 people. Now, we are a played by millions on
tors such as Andreas Klinger, Vismay Agrawal and Nikunj This is for a 400MW project in Guj- Engie looking to partner any PE a partner in some form. It could be an more ‘glocal’ company. their commute, has reached
Jalan, among others. Ahmedabad-based PierSight will arat that we won late last year where the investors, sovereign wealth funds, operational partner but will most likely We understand the regulation and $20 billion in revenue since
deploy the fresh capital for hiring talent and procuring offtaker is GVNL. The financing is get- pension funds or family offices for be a financial partner. The idea is to see how the market is evolving. If you see, its 2012 launch, maker King
essential electronic components for integration and compre- ting in place. We are discussing with funding? how this partnership plays out. 1GW in nine years is not huge in terms said, adding that it would

hensive testing. In addition, it is also looking to partner with financial institutions like Asian Infra-
social and environmental agencies for solutions, developing structure Investment Bank (AIIB) and
prototypes, and collaborating on studies. Asian Development Bank (ADB) and
others. We should finalize that process
by November this year to get the
Varanium Capital, Yatra Angel project finance lender on board.
The ADB was a power finance lender
Network back Zeron’s R&D plans to our 200MW project in Gujarat
Bengaluru: Zeron has secured $500,000 in a seed funding round which has already been commissioned.
led by Varanium Capital, with participation from Yatra Angel Net- So, it was natural that we talk to them.
work. The fresh proceeds will be used for Zeron’s ongoing research Are you talking to the likes of
and development (R&D) initiatives and expanding its global pres- Power Finance Corp and REC?
ence. Earlier this year, the startup raised funding from early-stage We are talking to PFC, REC, and
investors 100X.VC along with angel investors like Anoop Mathur IREDA as well as private banks and
(AM Capital), and K.R.S. Jamwal (Tata Industries). Founded by institutions. We run a process usually
Sanket Sarkar, Zeron is a cybersecurity firm that offers solutions for this and we have a shortlisting pro-
for organizations aiming to secure their cyberspace. It uses AI to cess which is ongoing. It is in final sta-
ensure clients make well-informed decisions, effectively counter- ges and we should be announcing by
ing the cybersecurity challenges. November or December.
COMPILED BY K. AMOGHAVARSHA From which other non-Indian
‘
This works at two levels—one is Whether they will come at the of operational capacity. soon release levels up to
at the project financ- development stage or We have a group ambition of about 15,000 for the most dedi-
ing level where we after commissioning 4GW commissioned capacity every cated players.
have another 300MW We have been in India date or after four years year till 2025 and then 2026 onwards First appearing on a web-
project that we for quite a while now, of commissioning, we we will commission 6GW of renewa- site, it shifted to Facebook
recently got the LOA since we acquired don’t know that yet. ble capacity at the group level glo- and then mobile, where it
(letter of allotment) We had Kotak bally. India is one of the key markets to took off and has now been
for. It is an NTPC Solairedirect in 2015. We Investment Banking drive that capacity. So, we are strong downloaded 5 billion times.
project which is going have seen the entire helping us structure it. in the US, Europe, Brazil and then in It pioneered the “free-
to come on the block renewable space evolve Not helping us find a terms of scale, India is that level of mium” model, in which the
to raise project partner but structur- scale. We don’t operate in China in the game is free but players can
Amit Jain
finance. Engie India managing director
ing the whole partner renewable space, so which other mar- spend money to boost their
On the partnership universe to see what ket could give you that growth? The performance or can watch ads
side, in India, we are partnership model will plans by the government on the mar- to gain moves.
looking at how we will grow in next align with our ambitions. We want to ket side helped us leverage growth on King president Tjodolf
phase. In the past, we had partnerships grow in India and are open to different that scale. Sommestad said Candy Crush
with Edelweiss. We sold a 74% stake in kinds of partners—pension funds, sov- We are hoping to double our capac- Saga and its other titles like
about 600MW of our operational ereign funds, family offices, or high net ity from 1.1GW to 2.3-2.4GW by 2025. Farm Heroes Saga showed
assets a couple of years ago. worth individuals (HNIs). Now that we have a foundation set, the that mobile games could have
We are looking at the partnership But the idea would be to see what we idea is to use that to accelerate growth. enduring appeal.
“We’ve proven to our-
selves and to the industry
that it is possible to reignite

Creaegis leads $35 mn fundraise Bright Money raises $62 mn to expand games that are years old and
keep them relevant for a
decade or longer, and break

in healthtech startup Doceree K Amoghavarsha

k.amoghavarsha@livemint.com
while a smaller team is present
in the US.
records even a decade in,”
Sommestad said in an inter-
view.
BeNgaLuru In 2022, VCCircle reported Todd Green, Candy Crush
Malvika Maloo The latest round of invest- the startup had laid off close to general manager, said the

S
malvika.maloo@livemint.com ment comes about less than 18 an Francisco-based fin- 100 people or 50% of its work- game was constantly updated
BeNgaLuru months after Doceree raised tech startup Bright force. The startup, however, to make it more satisfying,
$11 million in Series A round of Money has raised $62 stated that 29% of its team, or from optimising the tiny

H
ealthtech startup
Doceree, which runs a
physician-only plat-
form, has secured $35 million
as a part of its Series B fun-
draise from a bunch of inves-
tors led by homegrown private
equity firm Creaegis.
Its existing investors Eight
Roads Ventures and F-Prime
Capital also participated in the
round.
Doceree aims to use the
fund to improve its product
development and technology,
while it looks to expand glo-
bally and further build its
team, it said in a statement.
Four-year-old Doceree,
founded by Harshit Jain, offers
pharmaceutical and life-scien-
ces companies and healthcare
media agencies with tools to
reach healthcare professionals
(HCP). The startup uses artifi-
cial intelligence to facilitate
better communication with
HCPs, offering end-to-end
solutions to its clients.
“It is incredible to watch our
Doceree MD & global CEO
Harshit Jain.
innovative products disrupt
the space and drive adoption
of programmatic technology
in the life-sciences industry,
not just in evolved markets like
the US, but also elsewhere in
the same vein ,” said Jain, man-
aging director and global chief
executive of Doceree.
The startup began its opera-
tions in US, and has since
expanded to other regions
such as Europe, Southeast Asia
(SEA), and the Gulf region,
besides India.
“The investment speaks vol-
umes about the value we are
creating in the space,” he said.
funding. Eight Roads led the
round with participation from
F-Prime Capital and Alkemi
Growth Capital. Doceree
claims to have grown about 2X
in the last year.
The startup had secured $1
million in 2020 in its seed
funding round led by Beyond
Codes founder and CEO
Kumar Gaurav, with participa-
tion from a group of
angel investors in
India and the US.
Doceree raised an
undisclosed amount in its pre-
series A funding round in June
2021.
“Our past experience of
investing in pioneering global
SaaS companies and in the
healthcare ecosystem will ena-
ble us to support the com-
pany’s mission to create supe-
rior outcomes for pharma
brands, providers and
patients,” Prakash Parthasara-
thy, managing partner, and
Nitish Bandi, partner, Creae-
gis, said in a statement.
million in a mix of debt financ-
ing and equity infusion from
new as well as existing inves-
tors.
While new investor Encina
Lender Finance provided a
debt of $50 million, existing
investors Alpha Wave Global,
Peak XV (erstwhile Sequoia
India) and Hummingbird VC
collectively infused $12 million
in follow-on bets.
This investment is
poised to help Bright
Money build its pres-
ence among millennials in the
US, according to a statement.
“We have seen a 6x growth
in the last year and now reach
hundreds of thousands of
users,” said Avi Patchava,
co-founder and co-chief exec-
utive officer at Bright Money.
Founded by Patchava, Petko
Plachkov, Varun Modi, Avin-
ash Ramakanth, Jay Merwade
and Amit Bendale, Bright
Money focuses on personal
lending and credit cards.
Its tools include credit score
46 employees, had been bounce when candies land in
handed the pink slip as part of the grid to adding new levels,
a restructuring exercise. including the 15,000 mile-
Meanwhile, Peak XV Part- stone.
ners is the venture capital firm Candy Crush has been the
rebranded from Sequoia India top-grossing franchise in US
and Southeast Asia. In June, app stores for the last six
The investment is poised to help Bright Money build its presence Sequoia Capital had years, a fact Sommestad said
among millennials in the US, according to a statement. ISTOCK announced its move to sepa- underlined both the success
rate its US, China, India and of King’s strategy and the
building, automated debt pay- round from Peak XV, Alpha Southeast Asia operations challenge for new game
down plans, financial and bud- Wave Global and Humming- under independent firms. developers.
get planning and refinancing bird Ventures. It was also part Sequoia was the umbrella “We do have an effort to
loans. of the first cohort of Peak XV’s brand for three already largely build new games, but the bar
“The funding Surge pro- independent ventures: one is very high and it takes a lot to
will be deployed The firm’s tools gramme and focused on China, another on launch a new game nowa-
towards building include credit counts the likes of the US and Europe, and a third days,” he said.
teams across score building, InMobi founders on India and Southeast Asia. “Candy Crush took us a few
product develop- automated Naveen Tewari By way of the separation, the months to build but we added
ment, technol- and Abhay Sin- Sequoia China business 10 years of development after
debt paydown
ogy, analytics and ghal, Cred’s Kunal retained its existing name in that,” Sommestad said.
support func- plans, and Shah, Jupiter’s Chinese and adopted the name King has been owned since
tions like compli- refinancing loans Jitendra Gupta, HongShan in English whereas 2016 by Activision Blizzard,
ance and cus- Ram Shriram of Sequoia India and Southeast the US company behind “Call
tomer service,” Sherpalo Ven- Asia became Peak XV Part- of Duty” that has agreed to a
added Plachkov, co-founder tures and Ram Pandit, as its ners. $69 billion takeover by Mic-
and co-chief executive officer, angel investors. Last week, the firm co-led rosoft. King contributed $747
Bright Money. Bright Money has around the $12 million Series A fund- million in net revenue in the
In 2021, Bright Money 180 employees, with much of ing round of the visa applica- second quarter, 31% of Activi-
raised $31 million in a Series A its team operating from India, tion platform Atlys. sion’s total.

Subramaniam is Intel India president

Shraddha Goled communications group (SMG) Department for Promotion of
shraddha.goled@livemint.com will continue to lead the chip- Industry and Internal Trade
BeNgaLuru maker’s overall business here. (DPIIT), who assumed addi-
Subramaniam is an alumnus tional charge in March 2023.

C
hipmaker Intel has ele-
vated Gokul Subrama-
niam to the post of
India president. He will be
responsible for the company’s
overall engineering and design
operations in India.
Subramaniam
has been working
with Intel for over
11 years and is vice president of
client computing group (CCG)
of the University of Madras Intel held its two-day Intel
and the University of Texas. Innovation 2023 event in San
Before joining Intel in 2012, Jose this month (19-20 Sep-
Subramaniam worked with tember). At the event, the
Texas Instruments. company provided updates on
“As a critical engineering its next-generation process-
and design center ors, including the launch of
for Intel, Intel India 5th Gen Xeon processors and
plays a vital role in Intel Core Ultra processors on
our company’s 14 December. Intel also
transformation journey and
the trajectory towards product
Gokul Subramaniam.

for 29 years across several

and general manager of client
platforms and systems. He will
assume India president role in
addition to leading client plat-
forms and systems in CCG.
Santhosh Viswanathan, vice
president and managing
leadership,” said Subrama-
niam.
To be sure, Subramaniam’s
appointment comes a few
months after Nivruti Rai
resigned as the Intel India
country head in June 2023.
roles including design engi-
neer, vice president, and
finally the country head. Rai is
now the managing director
(MD) and chief executive offi-
cer (CEO) of Invest India, tak-
ing charge from Manmeet K
announced the general availa-
bility of Intel Developer Cloud
HAVE FUN
WITH FACTS ON SUNDAYS
for building and testing high-
performance applications. Catch the latest column of
Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger spoke
about the rise of Siliconomy in
his keynote speech, which A
refers to economic expansion A quiz on the week’s development.
through ‘sustainable, open hindustantimes htTweets www.hindustantimes.com

director-sales, marketing and She worked with the company Nanda, joint secretary of and secure computing power’.
04 ThurSDay, 28 SepTember 2023
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66,118.69 0.26 19,716.45 0.26 17,341.60 0.38 45,222.60 0.14 19,654.95 0.25 32,309.87 0.76 37,476.71 0.68
PREVIOUS CLOSE OPEN PREVIOUS CLOSE OPEN PREVIOUS CLOSE OPEN PREVIOUS CLOSE OPEN PREVIOUS CLOSE OPEN PREVIOUS CLOSE OPEN PREVIOUS CLOSE OPEN

65,945.47 65,925.64 19,664.70 19,637.05 17,276.75 17,270.40 45,158.90 45,173.50 19,606.05 19,583.40 32,066.50 32,157.28 37,225.00 37,320.49
HIGH LOW HIGH LOW HIGH LOW HIGH LOW HIGH LOW HIGH LOW HIGH LOW

66,172.27 65,549.96 19,730.70 19,554.00 17,352.10 17,217.45 45,245.00 44,896.75 19,668.00 19,498.45 32,336.99 32,048.15 37,507.65 37,249.86

m MINT SHORTS
US mortgage rate hits 22-year
For tyre stocks, best days are past
high of 7.41%, curbing demand Harsha Jethmalani
Waning benefits ings per share estimates of domestic FY24 remains to be seen. For now, ana-
US mortgage rates jumped last week to the highest level harsha.j@htlive.com tyre-makers by 5-10%, to account for the lysts are penciling in 7-8% volume
since 2000, taking a toll on already depressed home-pur- With costs of key inputs rising, tyre sector margins may come under pressure rise in input cost,” said IIFL’s report on growth for the sector in FY24.

T
chase applications. The contract rate on a 30-year fixed yre stocks have been on a roll.
mortgage rose 10 basis points to 7.41% in the week ended Shares of Apollo Tyres Ltd,
22 September, according to Mortgage Bankers Associa- MRF Ltd, JK Tyre & Indus-
tion data out Wednesday. As a result, the index of home- tries Ltd, Ceat Ltd and Bal-
purchase applications fell to 144.8, one of the lowest krishna Industries Ltd have
readings in decades. The latest pickup in borrowing costs gained about 36-71% over the past one
is making the housing market — already one of the least year. Tyre companies had hiked prices
affordable on record — even worse. Despite elevated and input costs were softening, which
financing costs, home prices continue to rise amid the together meant a sharp expansion in
limited supply of homes for sale. Part of the reason for margins. But now, the outlook on both
that lean inventory is because many homeowners don’t factors has turned adverse.
want to move in the current high-rate environment. “If oil prices continue to rise, then
Moving would cause them to lose the lower mortgage operating margin for the tyre sector
rate they locked in years prior. Builders have stepped in could see about 100 basis points erosion
to replenish housing inventories. BLOOMBERG in FY24 from our earlier estimates of
13-14%,” said Anuj Sethi, senior director,
Crisil Ratings.
Benchmark Brent crude oil prices
have increased by 25% in the last three
months to $94/barrel. While domestic
natural rubber prices are still lower,
international rubber is heading north-
ward. Further, a weaker rupee would
translate into higher cost of imported
raw materials.
As such, the impact of movement in
raw material costs on margins comes
with a lag for tyre companies, depend-
ing on exhaustion of existing inventory.
going ahead. 26 September. IIFL’s analysis assumes Amid this, capital expenditure (capex)
Raw material cost breakup for tyre companies JM Tyre Raw Material Index crude at $85/barrel. intensity is set to moderate and that is
in FY23 (in %) 160 This time around, even as input costs encouraging. “We expect the sector’s
Chemicals are growing, tyre companies have little capex at about ₹4,000 crore in FY24,
room to raise prices because margins compared with about ₹4,500 crore on
140 are already quite robust. average in the preceding
9.0
Q1FY24 Plus, competition is a worry SLippERy three fiscal years,” Sethi
13.3 123.3 and demand prospects are ROad said. Hereon, capex
Others 120 not enticing enough. A tyre incurred by tyre companies
dealers’ channel check by RiSinG input is expected to be used for
49.9 Jul
JM Financial Institutional costs have maintenance and debottle-
13.5 Rubber Aug prompted trimming
Fabrics 100
Securities showed that the of earnings growth necking purposes rather
replacement market expectations than aggressive capacity
14.3 96.8 demand remains mixed in additions, as capacity utili-
Carbon
Q2FY24. MUtEd demand zation is over 75%. More-
black 80 prospects
Q1FY19 Sep 2023 Replacement demand along with high over, balance sheets show a
accounts for the lion’s share competition are comforting picture. “Gear-
Note: The September reading is an estimate based
on current market prices of key raw materials of tyre companies’ reve- other dampeners ing - a gauge of debt posi-
Source: Company, Kotak Institutional Equities Source: Bloomberg, Industry, JM Financial
nue.“While passenger car tion, for the sector, is
radial tyre demand remains expected to improve to
SATISH KUMAR/MINT
stable, demand for two-wheeler tyres is around 0.4 times as on 31 March 2024
Thus, tyre companies would sail clocked higher-than-average Ebitda showing green shoots. Truck & bus/off- from 0.6 times as on 31 March 2023,”
through in the September quarter margin and ‘Ebitda per tonne’ (all-time the-road tyre demand remains muted Sethi added. Now, the question is
(Q2FY24) earnings season. However, high, in some cases),” Ebitda is earnings owing to seasonality,” said the JM whether factors like prudent capex
the days of super-normal margin before interest, taxes, depreciation and Financial report on 26 September. plans and better balance sheets would
growth are largely behind. The pain amortization, a key measure of profita- Sure, demand could look better in the be adequate for tyre stocks to sustain
should begin to creep up Q3 onwards. bility. “Our earnings estimates now fac- second half of FY24 aided by the festive their valuations, that are currently
IIFL Securities’ analysts point out, “In tor normalised levels of margins across season sales. But whether this would above historical averages. Perhaps not,
recent quarters, tyre makers have companies. We cut FY25/FY26 earn- drive volume growth meaningfully in if crude rises continuously.

Professional, scientific and technical businesses in UK

have gone down in the last four years. BLOOMBERG PVR Inox needs the good picture to sustain beyond Sep quarter
UK loses tax-registered biz for Vineetha Sampath In the next two quarters, the recent trends partially ease con- struggle to keep its occupancy
Subdued
the first time since March 2011 vineetha.s@livemint.com movie pipeline includes The cerns around structural risks rates near pre-covid levels, post
The number of UK businesses registered to pay VAT and Vaccine War, Tiger 3, Animal, Shares of PVR Inox have underperformed the Nifty 500 index and calls for some re-rating. We a strong September quarter per-
in 2023 so far.

F
employee taxes has fallen for the first time in a decade, or PVR Inox Ltd, a near- Dunki and Leo. However, a key raise FY2024-26 Ebitda esti- formance,” said Karan Taurani,
reflecting a surge in post-covid insolvencies and cost-of- term risk has abated with risk to footfalls in the December 120 mates by 5-24%,” said Kotak’s an analyst at Elara Securities
112.25
PVR Inox Nifty 500
living pressures. A total of 2.73 million businesses were the Writers Guild of Amer- quarter is the 2023 ICC Men’s 110
analysts in a report on 25 Sep- (India). Moreover, ticket prices
signed up in March 2023 to pay so-called Value Added ica calling off their strike that Cricket World Cup matches, tember. Ebitda is earnings have gone up and that would
Tax or Pay As You Earn, the system used to collect began in May. A prolonged which start 5 October. To curtail 100 before interest, tax, deprecia- weigh on footfalls, he added.
income tax and National Insurance from employees, the strike may have weighed on the the potential adverse impact to 99.71 tion and amortization. Thus, it may be a bit early to
90
Office for National Statistics said Wednesday. This was release of Hollywood movies. some extent, PVR Inox plans to But consistency is key. Earn- extrapolate that the good run of
down 1.5% from the same time a year ago. It was the first Remember Hollywood contrib- specifically screen the matches 80
ings visibility would improve on movies seen in the September
drop since March 2011, when the number of businesses uted 24% to PVR Inox’s gross played by India. continued momentum in con- quarter would sustain. Having
registered slipped 0.9% from the previous year. While box office collection in the June The September quarter 70 tent performance and in turn, said that, the woes around com-
30 Dec 2022 27 Sep 2023
the professional, scientific and technical businesses quarter. Note that the Screen results are expected to be solid Values rebased to 100 Source: Capitaline
aid the sentiments for the stock. petition from over-the-top plat-
made up the largest group at 15.2% of all firms, their Actors Guild - American Feder- with movies such as Jawan, “While big budget movies are forms appears to have lessened.
number has diminished for the last four years. This ation of Television and Radio Gadar 2, Jailer, Rocky aur Rani SATISH KUMAR/MINT
delivering, smaller ones are not PVR Inox’s shares have risen by
could pose a major headache for Prime Minister Rishi Artists strike is still on. kii Prem Kahani and Oppen- June quarter. higher than the earlier estimate firing enough. For now, the PVR 28% from their 52-week lows of
Sunak, who has vowed to build the UK’s future on a In any case, PVR Inox can heimer performing well. Thus, For FY24, Kotak Institutional of 26.5%. Notably, this is still Inox stock seems to be factoring ₹1,336.40 apiece in May, but
“knowledge economy” driven by technical and science- bank on the good pipeline of occupancy levels are likely to be Equities expects PVR Inox’s below the pre-pandemic levels these positives, but near-term they have been flattish in the
based businesses. BLOOMBERG Bollywood and regional movies. higher than 22.3% seen in the occupancy to settle at 28%, a tad of 31-32%. “We believe that the catalysts are missing as it may past one year.

Mark to Market writers do not have positions in the companies they have discussed here

Sebi imposes ₹5 lakh China property stocks slide Adani Ports to buy back another
fine on Yes Securities Bloomberg
feedback@livemint.com
at the end of October. Investors Estate Co. denied it has
are bracing for further troubles defaulted on debt after the
$195 million of its 2024 bond
at some distressed builders nation’s regulator said it’s
Staff writer Bloomberg

C
hinese property stocks after policy support failed to launched an inquiry over an worth of debt taken out for an
feedback@livemint.com tumbled to their lowest drive a sustainable recovery in overdue loan payment. feedback@livemint.com acquisition, having suffered a
New Delhi levels since October home sales. While developers That’s as Country Garden blow earlier this year after

A
2011 as worries about liquidity are counting on the Golden Holdings Co. faces another dani Ports and Special Hindenburg Research levied

M
arkets regulator the
Securities and
Exchange Board of
India (Sebi) on Wednesday
imposed a fine of ₹5 lakh on
brokerage Yes Securities for
irregularities pertaining to set-
tlement of client funds, short-
age in collection of margin and
for not adhering to leverage
and exposure limits.
Sebi along with the stock
exchanges, inspected the
accounts of Yes Securities in
2022 during which the regu-
lator discovered several dis-
crepancies in reporting.
These include irregularities in
monthly and quarterly settle-
ment of funds, short collec-
tion of margins, and discrep-
ancy reporting networth,
among others.
The 22-page Sebi order said
Yes Securities acknowledged
some instances wherein reten-
tion statements and statement
of accounts were sent to incor-
Sebi spotted irregularities
pertaining to settlement of
client funds. HT
The regulator, however,
noted that the material availa-
ble on record does not quan-
tify any disproportionate gain
made by the brokerage. It also
noted that the losses made by
any of the investors due to
such violations on part of the
brokerage could not be ascer-
tained.
“However, it is pertinent to
note that the role of a Broker/
Trading Member (TM) is cru-
cial to the development of the
and weak housing demand
intensified ahead of a weeklong
trading break on the mainland.
A Bloomberg Intelligence
gauge of developer shares
closed down 3.5% on Wednes-
day. The biggest drag was CIFI
Holdings Group Co., which
plunged 59% as trading
resumed following months of
suspension. The gauge is now
down more than a third for the
year, compared with the 9%
decline in the broader Hang
Seng China Enterprises Index.
The selloff has now erased all
of the sector’s gains since
China’s reopening rally took off
Citadel is ready to fight with SEC over WhatsApp probe
Bloomberg
feedback@livemint.com
Week holiday to revive sales round of interest payments on Economic Zone Ltd. accusations of malfeasance
momentum, a Wednesday, will buy back as much that triggered a selloff in its
stream of negative A stream of keeping investors as $195 million of its 2024 bonds and shares. Adani
headlines on the negative on edge as they bond, as the Indian conglom- repeatedly denied the claims.
sector’s distress headlines brace for a poten- erate backed by billionaire Bond buybacks allow com-
may keep buyers on the sector’s tial default by a Gautam Adani seeks to move panies to repurchase debt
away. major developer. on from the allegations levied through tender offers to bond-
distress
Just this week, The govern- by a US shortseller. holders, enabling them to
fresh drama may keep ment will have to The 3.375% notes jumped Adani Ports said it would fund the retire some or all of the securi-
unfolded at China buyers away “eventually pro- the most since April on news purchase from its cash reserves. AP ties ahead of their due date.
Evergrande vide some solu- the company would pay $975 The announcement marks
Group, with its tion to Country for every $1,000 in principal fund the purchase from its the Indian firm’s second ten-
restructuring process coming Garden and other failing or for debt tendered by 11 Octo- cash reserves and said the der offer for its 2024 notes in
to a halt and its billionaire failed developers, if not, it ber. Thereafter, the offer price bond in question has $520 mil- just a few months. It intends to
chairman put under police would be difficult to boost hous- drops to $965 per $1,000, it lion in principal outstanding. continue repurchasing notes
control. China Oceanwide ing and investor sentiment,” said in a statement on The announcement takes in the coming quarters.
Holdings Ltd is getting liqui- said Jeremy Yeo, an analyst at Wednesday. place just as Adani Group Adani’s announcement
dated while Ping An Real SMBC Nikko Securities Inc. Adani Ports said it would seeks to refinance $3.5 billion bucks the global trend.
to be identified discussing pri- Bloomberg reported in Feb- Last year, the agency intro-
vate conversations. ruary that Citadel was under duced a plan to overhaul US
The Miami-based firm SEC investigation for alleged trading regulations that would

rect email addresses due to
typographical errors adding
that the broking house recti-
fied the issues when it noticed
the problem.
“I note that Noticee has
belatedly sent the retention
statements i.e after a period of
5 days as against within 5 days
time required under the pro-
visions of Sebi circular and
also erred in sending state-
ment of accounts in wrong
email IDs as mentioned herein
above,” said Sebi’s adjudica-
tion officer Santosh Kumar
Sharma in the order.
securities market, especially
for the entry of the small
investors for whom the broker
is the first mile of contact,”
Sebi said.
It added that in this regard,
the role of trading members
is crucial as a facilitator of
small investors into the secu-
rities market. “So, it is of
utmost importance that every
TM abides by the relevant
regulations, provisions of
Sebi/Exchange circulars and
various guidelines issued by
Sebi/Exchanges,” the Sebi
order said.
C
itadel is preparing to
push back against the
WhatsApp probe by
the Securities and Exchange
Commission (SEC), taking a
harder line than the almost
two dozen banks that have
paid hefty settlements over the
past two years.
Ken Griffin’s hedge fund has
told industry peers that it plans
to battle the SEC if the regula-
tor moves against Citadel,
according to people familiar
with the talks. And it’s willing
to take the agency to court,
said the people, who asked not
would be the first to fight the
SEC over any allegations of
untracked communications.
As a hedge fund, it would likely
argue that it’s not subject to
the same rules as Wall Street
banks like JPMorgan Chase &
Co. and Bank of America
Corp., which agreed to pay
more than $2.5 billion to settle
US regulators’ investigations
into their employees using
unofficial messaging plat-
forms for business.
“Citadel takes seriously its
obligation to comply fully with
the SEC’s investment adviser
unmonitored communica-
tions, though the agency has
yet to formally move against
the fund and could ultimately
decide against bringing an
action.
Under Chair Gary Gensler,
the SEC has significantly
stepped up its scrutiny of the
Ken Griffin, CEO of Citadel, is willing to push back against the $26 trillion private funds market
SEC probe if action is taken against it REUTERS through new rules and enforce-
ment actions. In response,
rules and regulations, includ- communications,” the com- hedge fund and private equity
ing those concerning the pany said in an emailed state- industry groups have sued the
proper monitoring and ment. regulator over its clampdown on
record-keeping of our The SEC declined to com- how these firms conduct busi-
employees’ business-related ment. ness with investors.
affect Citadel Securities, the
market maker that is part of
Griffin’s business empire.
Under SEC rules, many
institutions have to save their
business communications.
This helps regulators root out
fraud and misconduct in the
markets. The agency’s investi-
gators have found that many
bankers were communicating
with each other on personal
mobile phones—and that
those records weren’t being
saved. As of August, 23 firms
were sanctioned by the SEC
for the practice.
S-37931/3
06 ThurSDay, 28 SepTember 2023
New Delhi CORPORATE LIVEMINT.COM

China’s steel
Meta works to comply with Cost optimization:
output caps Byju’s puts on hold
buoy global
firms: Mittal
India’s data protection Act campus placement
Devina Sengupta &
Bloomberg Sneha Shah
feedback@livemint.com
Ensuring compliance poses operational complications for Meta, says global affairs chief MuMBAI

G
lobal steelmakers will

finally start to see some
reprieve from the flood
of Chinese exports that has
been inundating the market
Shouvik Das & Gulveen Aulakh one platform to another, and there’s no
NeW DelhI point in us watermarking our content if
other content isn’t similarly marked.”
B
yju’s will opt out of cam-
pus placements this year
amid extensive cost-cut-
ting measures at the edtech

and pressuring other suppliers,
according to Aditya Mittal,
chief executive officer of Arcel-
orMittal SA, the world’s sec-
ond-largest steelmaker. He
sees Chinese government
mandates for output cuts as
helping cut exports from the
nation for the next five to 10
years. He also cited require-
ments for local government
approvals before building new
steel facilities in the country as
well as trade actions from the
Europe and the US against the
Asian nation.
When it comes to Chinese
steel exports, “I don’t expect
that the pressure will dramati-
cally increase because of the
limitations that have been put
on Chinese capacity,” he said
during a virtual lecture at Bra-
zil’s annual steel conference.
“Nevertheless, as an industry,
we have to work to identify if
there are surges and certain
product ranges and what we
can do to counter that.”
China’s move to constrain its
steel output marks the end of
an era for the industry after
years of breakneck growth.
Mittal’s comments come at a
time when the industry has
been particularly concerned
that Chinese mills could inun-
date the global market this year
because domestic demand has
remained subdued. Mittal said
he’s “very bullish” about the
outlook for the industry, even
as the supply from China
remains a concern for competi-
tors.
M
eta Platforms Inc., which On Wednesday, Meta announced firm that resulted in more than
runs social media plat- multiple AI initiatives and features for all 13,000 layoffs in the past year.
forms Facebook, Insta- of its platforms, which include AI assist- Engineering colleges,
gram and WhatsApp, is ants for search and image generation, including some of the Indian
working to comply with watermarking to segregate images and, Institutes of Technology (IITs),
India’s recently enacted Digital Personal eventually, policies to define transpar- were in discussions with Byju’s Byju Raveendran, founder &
Data Protection (DPDP) Act within the ency of AI usage on mainstream plat- about campus recruitments but CEO of Byju’s. MINT
proposed timeframes. forms. have not received confirmation
However, ensuring compliance poses Speaking about the possibility of a on the hiring schedule on the Byju’s had skipped hiring
operational complications, including global AI regulatory framework, Clegg back of more retrenchments. from some of the top IITs last
aspects of Meta’s policies that are not said it is “both possible and desirable”. “Byju’s is unlikely to hire year as well, but some junior
fully aligned with Indian laws, Nick “The technology is evolving fast and from any campus this year, and level recruitments did happen.
Clegg, president of global affairs at Meta, doesn’t respect borders. So, the sooner it will take about 6-7 months for Placement teams in the
said in an interview. Speaking about the we get a common alignment, particu- the restructuring in the com- younger IITs were in touch
potential timeframe that the ministry of larly in the largest techno-democracies pany to get completed. Until with the company for their
electronics and information technology globally, such as the US, EU and India, then, cost optimization plans recruitments but have not
(Meity) is expected to offer Big Tech the better. There are many ways to won’t allow any hiring,” said a received any confirmation yet.
firms to comply with rules under the achieve this—through OECD, G7, G20, senior executive aware of the “Even if they had confirmed, it
DPDP Act, Clegg said, “The devil is in Nick Clegg, president of global affairs at Meta. BLOOMBERG then legislative processes in the US, the development. is unlikely that students would
the details here. Of course, we can UK, India, and even Japan. What we’re The company has been be keen to sit for their place-
implement existing solutions that we India’s data protection law. elections—something Clegg said Meta is all trying to do as an industry is to urge rationalizing costs for the last 12 ments,” said a placement team
already have faster than creating While Meity has not decided the exact already taking note of. everyone to converge on a set of basic months, and this is the fourth member in one of the youngest
bespoke India-specific solutions. Our timeframe as yet, Big Tech companies “We’re conscious of elections coming standards—particularly that of transpar- round of layoffs it IITs.
India team is working with government such as Meta are expected to be offered up next year in India, Europe, Britain, ency,” he said. has announced Byju’s has stated According to a
stakeholders to implement the legisla- six months to become compliant with Mexico and even the US. For this, we’ll He also called for “common standards since last October. that its placement official
tive recommendations under the DPDP the DPDP Act. be publishing more information on how on detectability and watermarking More than 13,000 restructuring in one of the older
Act as rapidly as we can, based on the Meta is cumulatively the world’s larg- we’re developing new technology to go across the industry”—which can further people seem to plans will take IITs, there are
expectations that have been set est social media platform—data after misinformation and label it boost the transparency of AI. have been hit by more than a thou-
about seven
for us.” from market researcher Sta- even more rapidly than we’ve Speaking about India’s regu- the retrenchment sand students to
However, compliance, tista from January this year done before. People often latory approach, Clegg said drive. months to be place, and while
Clegg said, “depends mas-
sively on each different 6.9 bn
Global total of
states that it has 6.9 billion worry about what AI (arti-
monthly active users ficial intelligence) will 480 mn
Total monthly
the country has pro-
ceeded on the right
Another execu-
tive aware of the
completed companies are not
barred from com-
aspect of the law.” (MAUs) globally. India is create, thus leading to note—especially in the company’s plans ing in, their report
“Some aspects are eas- monthly active Meta’s biggest market misinformation—they active users of area of nascent technolo- said it is unlikely to hire people cards are explained to the stu-
ier to comply with than users of Meta globally in terms of user forget that AI is actually a WhatsApp in India gies such as AI. currently across levels. “The dents. “There is full disclosure,
others since we’d have also base, with over 480 million sword and not a shield. It’ll “It makes sense to try and new management and advisers and students have to make the
dealt with some aspects in MAUs of WhatsApp and 230 allow us to track or label mis- regulate the outcomes of tech- have set in motion a cost ration- choice. Often, the campus hir-
other geographies. Where the million of Instagram in the coun- information, and even track it in nologies like AI but not legislate alization plan that will take ing strategies are different from
adaptations to the Indian law are not try, as per Statista data. multiple different languages—perhaps the technology itself. In India, neither Byju’s close to profitability and the overall manpower policies
very extensive, these aspects would be This makes compliance crucial for even hundreds,” he said. the DPDP Act nor the proposed Digital reduce the burn. Key non-core of a company,” said the place-
more complicated,” he added. Meta, which has had regulatory run-ins To do this, Meta is working on a India Act or the upcoming Telecom Bill areas have been identified, and ment official. Byju’s did not
On 14 September, Mint reported that with the Centre on multiple previous watermarking mechanism for global are trying to regulate the technology over the next six months, the respond to Mint’s queries sent
Meity is expected to offer a shorter occasions. coordination, which Clegg said will raise itself, which would be a futile thing to do plan will be executed,” he said on Wednesday .
timeframe to Big Tech firms, as well as The company has also been ques- the need for a global AI framework— since the tech is so fluid,” Clegg said. and added that any hiring, if at devina.sengupta@live-
large corporations, to comply with tioned globally, over time, on its role in “because a lot of content will flow from shouvik.das@livemint.com all, will happen only next year. mint.com

India wants WTO Demand for diamonds slumps Toyota plans third car plant in
rules on foodgrain FROM PAGE 1
India, new SUV as sales spike
grown diamonds) collapsing by
stocks scrapped 59% in the past three years,
according to a report by Edahn
Golan Diamond Research.
Reuters
feedback@livemint.com
NeW DelhI
then tweak and sell under their
own brands to fill out their
product line-up.
FROM PAGE 1 “In China, because of a gen- Toyota’s expansion in India,

T
eral economic slowdown…off- oyota Motor plans to the world’s third-largest car
minimum support price (MSP) take has completely ceased, build a third car plant in market, comes at a time when it
programme—the price at and the US is seeing around India, expanding pro- is seeing slowing growth in
which it procures foodgrains 5-10% dent in demand because duction capacity in the country markets such as Europe and
for public stock holdings— of tighter monetary condi- for the first time in over a dec- North America and competi-
amid a looming global food tions,” said Vipul Shah, man- ade as its partnership with Suz- tion in Southeast Asia from
crisis caused by the Ukraine aging director and chief exec- Trade bodies have asked members to halt the imports of rough uki Motor boosts domestic vol- Chinese players.
war. utive officer of Asian Star, stones for two months. MINT umes, two persons aware of the At present, it has two car
“India believes any negotia- another De Beers sightholder. development said. Toyota’s third plant will come plants in Bidadi, a town in Kar-
tions on domestic support Shah said a recovery from halt on imports of rough dia- are not picking up,” said Shah, The world’s biggest car- up at its Bidadi facility. REUTERS nataka, and the third one is
needs to first address existing this demand downturn “seems monds from 15 October to 15 who is also chairman of the maker wants the plant to start being planned on the same
asymmetries and imbalances more difficult” compared to December by their members. GJEPC. Traditionally, gems with capacity of in early 2026 and be an anchor premises. It added a third shift
in the WTO Agreement of past instances. Previous instances of such and jewellery demand picks up 80,000–120,000 vehicles a product for the new factory, at the two plants in May, raising
Agriculture (AoA). Thus, dis- India had to recently defend Low demand has led to a import interruptions include ahead of the festive season, but year, which could grow to said the person and a third their combined annual capac-
cussing disciplines on domes- its MSP programme amid a pile-up of inventory, and thus Saudi Arabia’s oil embargo in that is not happening this year. around 200,000 over time, source briefed on the com- ity by 30% to over 400,000
tic support for India must looming global food crisis. HT the call to halt imports, added 1973, the 1992 balance of pay- India imports rough dia- said one of the people who has pany’s plans. The persons vehicles.
begin with the removal of his- Shah. “That’s why we need to ments crisis in India, the 2008 monds from the likes of De direct knowledge of the plans. declined to be identified as the The new C-segment SUV,
torical asymmetries in domes- tioned by large foodgrain balance the supply-demand global financial crisis and in Beers, Rio Tinto and Russia’s The plant’s proposed initial automaker has not disclosed codenamed 340D, which
tic support,” the person cited exporters such as the US and dynamic and take a call on the 2019 due to a slowdown just Alrosa. The imports flow capacity would expand the expansion plans. A repre- Toyota is working on, will fill a
above stated. Canada over its PSH pro- evolving situation by Novem- months before the Pandemic. through BDB, from where Toyota’s existing manufactur- sentative for Toyota’s India gap between its mid-sized
“India advocates levelling of gramme on the grounds that it ber end.” The outlook, too, is none too they are shipped to Surat Dia- ing capacity in India by as much unit declined to comment. Urban Cruiser Hyryder and
the playing field by eliminat- is highly subsidized, especially Industry associations such promising with order books mond Bourse, where cutting as 30% from 400,000 units Toyota’s India sales have bigger multi-purpose vehicle
ing the FBTAMS entitlements for rice. as the commerce ministry- for cutting and polishing down and polishing happen before currently. soared due to a global partner- Innova Hycross, two of the per-
enjoyed by many members, India has invoked the ‘peace sponsored Gem and Jewellery compared to a year ago. polished diamonds are Toyota has also begun devel- ship with Suzuki under which sons said. It is working with
which allow them to provide clause’ several times at the Export Promotion Council “The domestic market is re-routed to BDB, from where opment of a new sport utility the two Japanese carmakers suppliers to produce 60,000
support beyond the de mini- WTO for breaching the 10% (GJEPC), BDB and Surat Dia- doing well, but wherever the they are exported to the US, vehicle (SUV) for the Indian take some vehicles originally units a year when it launches in
mis limits and vast flexibility to subsidy ceiling on rice pro- mond Bourse have called for a economy is struggling, exports Hong Kong and Belgium. market that would be launched developed by their partner, early 2026, they added.
concentrate product-specific curement.
support.” India has argued at the
However, there has been WTO’s Committee on Agricul-
resistance to any discussion on ture that it does not export
this issue, and no actual nego- common paddy, which it pro-
tiations have even cures under the
Cipla in advanced talks with two groups of buyout firms
started in the There has been MSP programme.
WTO. resistance to any It mainly exports FROM PAGE 1 even after the proposed pro- financing the promoters of the $6-6.5 billion require-
According to discussion on the premium quality moter exit. Torrent Pharma with another ment. “Certain LPs (limited
Third World Net- issue; no actual rice that is in the acquisition could be at The sale has been necessi- $3-4 billion for funding the partners) could also co-invest
work (TWN), a
negotiations have d e m a n d t h e least ₹51,000 crore ($6.1 bil- tated due to a lack of clear suc- mandatory open offer,” the alongside them. The final con-
think tank, devel- world over, the lion),” the first person said. cessors in the Hamied family first person said. tour is not known,” the second
oping countries even started in official added. Typically, in takeovers, the to run Cipla, according to sev- A spokesperson for Bain person said.
should strongly the WTO Queries sent to acquirer offers a premium to eral investment bankers. Capital declined to comment, A spokesperson from Gen-
raise the issue of a spokesperson the promoters of the target While Kotak Mahindra Cap- while a query sent to Apollo eral Atlantic declined to com-
disciplining for the commerce firm and a non-compete or ital is advising as the banker Global remained ment, while an
FBTAMS entitlements as they ministry remained unan- royalty fee. for Cipla’s promoters, JPMor- unanswered. One or two email sent to Bar-
remain “the primary source of swered at press time. “If the bidder offers a gan has been hired as the The Cipla take- members of the ing PE did not
inequity” in the AoA. India had informed the 10-20% premium to the mar- banker for Torrent Pharma’s over bid being promoter family e l i c i t any
“There is glaring irrational- WTO that the value of its rice ket price of Cipla for giving up promoters for the deal. discussed with may retain about response.
ity in allowing gigantic addi- production in 2019-20 stood control, more than 26% public A spokesperson for JPMor- bankers by the However, the
tional entitlements for a few at $46.07 billion and that it
5% of the firm as
shareholders may tender their gan declined to comment. consortium led by fate of the Cipla
countries that confer massive gave subsidies worth $6.31 bil- shares in the open offer, which Emailed queries sent to BPEA EQT and non-promoter takeover involves
advantages to them in terms of lion, or 13.7%, which is above would require the acquirer to spokespeople for Cipla and General Atlantic shareholders tricky issues due
policy space over all other and the 10% limit. bring in more funds. So, the Torrent Pharma remained Cipla chairman Yusuf K. Hamied. BLOOMBERG includes a direct to its rich legacy.
poorer countries,” TWN says. India, along with a group of actual size of the promoter exit unanswered. Emails sent to fresh cash deal for Cipla today
This inequity also under- developing and African deal could go up to $7 billion or spokespeople for Sun Pharma family offices of promoters of ers as per the latest discus- the Hamied family’s stake and operates across 47 manufactur-
pins many of the other issues nations, has also proposed a more,” one of the two people and Zydus Lifesciences did not other business houses at this sions,” the first person said. an investment from the exist- ing locations globally and sells
on the negotiating table, such permanent solution to public said. elicit any response. stage. And, for this, the family “According to the takeover ing corpus of some of the products in 86 countries. The
as public stock holdings (PSH) stockholding of foodgrains According to the people, “The Hamied family wants offices will get certain small plan, post the buyout of a emerging market funds man- firm has manufactured and
and special safeguard mecha- that would give them the flexi- one or two members of Cipla’s an all-cash deal. So, the pro- stakes in Cipla. Post the open majority promoter stake in aged by the two global PE supplied affordable generic
nisms that developing coun- bility to pay out higher farm promoter family may retain moter stake buyout will need offer, the Torrent Pharma pro- Cipla, private equity (PE) giants. drugs for treatments of several
tries have asked to address. support. about 5% of the company as $3-3.5 billion. Torrent’s pro- moters will own the largest firms, including Bain Capital Other PE firms will likely diseases and ailments since the
India is regularly ques- ravi.dutta@livemint.com non-promoter shareholders moters will be helped by the stake and be the sole promot- and Apollo Global, will be join the consortium to meet country’s Independence.
LIVEMINT.COM CORPORATE ThurSDay, 28 SepTember 2023
New Delhi 07

Foreign airlines DGCA can act against pilots

keen to set base at
Noida airport: CEO not serving notice: Delhi HC
Anu Sharma
anu.sharma@livemint.com
NeW DeLHi
The HC, however, did not allow any penal action against Akasa pilots as it hasn’t been sought
W
ith Delhi-NCR pre-
paring for its second AICPDF says low-price packs
airport in 2024, air- Krishna Yadav & Priyanka Gawande are eating up shelf space. MINT
lines, including foreign carriers NeW DeLHi/MuMbAi
have shown strong interest to
FMCG new
A
connect flights from Noida kasa Air on Wednesday
International Airport at Jewar got partial relief from the
to overseas destinations, said
Christoph Schnellmann, chief
high courts of Delhi and
Mumbai in cases involving
packs clog
executive officer, Noida Inter-
national Airport. Christoph Schnellmann, CEO,
“We have seen strong inter- Noida international airport.
pilots leaving the airline
without completing the mandatory six-
month notice period.
supply
est from domestic carriers and
international carriers as well. June 2022. As per the latest
While the Delhi high court clarified
that the Directorate General of Civil chains, say
We have been busy introduc- report, work on the structural Aviation (DGCA) is not restrained from
ing our airport project to the steel support for the roof at the
international airline commu- passenger terminal is under-
taking action against pilots in breach of
employment agreements with airlines,
distributors
nity and their interest has been way and the ATC tower is now it did not issue orders on Akasa’s pilots.
very, very high,” he added. standing at a height of over 30 The Bombay HC ruled that the court Suneera Tandon
“Increasing number of Indi- metres. Around 7000 workers has the jurisdiction to accept the air- suneera.t@htlive.com
ans want to fly, and more peo- are fully mobilised at the site. line’s plea in the matter. NeW DeLHi
ple from abroad want to fly to Within a few months, more The Delhi high court did not allow

T
and from India. Domestic and than 20 buildings will come up any action in the case involving Akasa’s he All India Consumer
international carriers want to at the site, including passenger pilots as the airline did not seek penal Products Distributors’
serve that demand, and are very terminal, office blocks, sewage action against the 43 pilots who were in Federation, which rep-
interested in Noida as the sec- and water treatment plants, breach of their contracts, but sought In October, Delhi HC will again examine whether DGCA can interfere in Akasa’s pilots quitting without serving notice. REUTERS resents fast-moving consumer
ond international airport serv- electric substations and ATC clarity and regulatory action against goods distributors, has raised
ing Delhi-NCR. The response towers. The airport also floated the pilots. The court also noted that numerous flights in September due to Company takes a call on that point. The high court also agreed to hear concerns over low-priced pack
that we have been getting has tenders for various other aero- Civil Aviation Requirement (CAR) 2017 abrupt pilot resignations, and asserted Either company may refuse to accept the matter to consider interim reliefs to of biscuit, noodles, chips, soap
been very encour- nautical and non- and previous 2018 and 2019 orders of that the resignations violated the terms resignation or may accept it condition- Akasa on 4 October. The airline is seek- and shampoo, causing supply
aging,” The airport is aeronautical con- the court on upholding CAR were clear of agreements. But DGCA opposed the ally or may accept it for future date.” ing ₹21.6 crore in compensation, com- chain disruptions and impact-
The airport’s well on its way cessions. Tenders on termination of pilots, and rejects the airline’s plea, emphasizing that it could A part of the cause of action has taken prising ₹14.28 crore for damages to its ing storage spaces across small
foundation was to complete the for food and bev- contention made by the DGCA that it not interfere in contractual relation- place in the jurisdiction of this court, reputation due to flight disruptions and mom-and-pop stores.
laid in November first phase of erage concessions cannot act against pilots in the case of ships between pilots and the airlines. and the Indian Contracts Act states that grounding, ₹6.96 crore for operational Large companies are ramp-
2021, and it is well and lounges are in breach of agreements. The Bombay high court, too, ruled in acceptance is complete when it comes profit loss and ₹36 lakh for pilots’ train- ing up innovations and intro-
construction place and adver-
on its way to finish The court also disposed of the ing agreements. ducing more price options for
by the end
the first phase of
of 2024
tising and ground Akasa pilots’ case, but decided to FAVOURABLE WINDS The recent wave of pilot resigna- product categories to take on
construction by handling conces- hear the case on whether the DGCA tions has proved to be a challenge competition by offering more
2024 end. In the sions will soon be has jurisdiction to interfere in the AKASA had moved THE airline claimed DGCA opposed the BOMBAYHC has let for Akasa Air, which started opera- affordable options to consum-
first phase, the shared. “In line case of Akasa’s pilots resigning its plea seeking it was forced to
clarity on mandatory cancel many flights
airline’s plea stating
it could not interfere
Akasa take legal
action against pilots
tions only in August 2022 with 20 ers amid declining household
airport is expected to handle 12 with our overall intent to create without serving their notice period. notice periods for in September owing in these contractual who had not served aircraft. The airline first sought budgets due to high inflation.
million passengers per year and an airport experience that The matter is scheduled to be pilots who have quit to the resignations relationships notice period DGCA intervention on 3 August, Of late, several companies
manage 96,400 flights. “We speaks of Swiss efficiency and heard again in October. invoking Rule 39A(2) of Aircraft introduced new stock-keeping
are working to see the airport is Indian hospitality, the food and Akasa Air had moved its plea Rule (1937) following the mass res- units (SKUs) with lower price
open for operations soon. Test beverage service will reflect seeking clarity on mandatory notice favour of Akasa Air, allowing the airline to their knowledge, he said. “Whether ignations. It also reported the situation points aimed at catering to the
flights will be organised a few that. It will have familiar home periods for pilots who have resigned. to proceed with its legal action against the resignation is repudiation or termi- to the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security, rural market. While this initia-
months before the commercial food and international cui- The airline implored DGCA to inter- pilots, who had not served their notice nation or cancellation can be gone into alleging the pilots did not return their tive holds potential for market
operations begin,” he said. sines.” On Tuesday, the Inter- vene and take action against its pilots periods after resigning. A Bombay HC later. For the reasons held above, I con- aerodrome entry permits and request- expansion it raised concerns
Engineering, procurement national Air Transport Associa- for breaching employment agree- bench led by Justice S.M. Modak said: clude that part of the cause of action has ing that the pilots be placed on a “Stop- over the viability of distribu-
and construction of the airport tion allotted a three-letter code ments. “I am inclined to grant leave since occurred in Mumbai and hence leave is List” for violating AEP guidelines. tion networks, AICPDF said on
was awarded to Tata Projects in DXN to Noida airport. Akasa claimed it was forced to cancel sending resignation is through mail. granted,” he said. krishna.yadav@livemint.com Wednesday. “The introduc-
tion of the new SKUs placed an
extra burden on existing infra-
structure and resources within

Tata Play Binge offers PaaS to go global SIG bets big on India, to invest distribution networks, affect-
ing efficiency,” said Dhairya-
shil Patil, national president of
Gaurav Laghate
gaurav.laghate@livemint.com
€100 mn on plant in Gujarat At the heart of Tata Play’s
aggregator solution is the aim
AICPDF.
Speaking to Mint Patil said
earlier companies would roll
MuMbAi to simplify the viewer’s experi- out limited low priced packs of
ence. Users will have the con- PTI building in the first phase. 3-4 with price points spanning

D
irect-to-home service venience of accessing content feedback@livemint.com “The initial commitment ₹2, ₹5, ₹10 or ₹15. Now they are
provider Tata Play (for- from multiple OTT platforms AHMeDAbAD comes close to €100 million,” introducing more price points
merly Tata Sky), which through a single application he said.Commercial produc- and variants with more gram-

also offers over-the-top aggre-
gation services, announced on
Wednesday the launch of Tata
Play Binge PaaS (platform as a
service), a white label solution
for OTT aggregators globally.
The company will be man-
aging its end-to-end technol-
ogy platform over the cloud to
offer services to international
players seeking to streamline
their OTT content distribution
operations.
Tata Play Binge, the aggre-
gator platform was launched
in 2020 only for DTH custom-
ers and extended to non-DTH
users earlier this year.
Tata Play managing director
and chief executive Harit Nag-
pal said the company signed its
first agreement with Philippi-
nes’ leading pay-TV provider,
Cignal TV, to offer Binge PaaS.
“All our efforts have always
been keeping in mind custom-
ers’ needs. As a DTH player, we
looked at offering hassle-free
and quality service. With more
and more OTT platforms com-
ing up, we realised customers
L
and subscription, neatly pre- eading packaging solu- tion is anticipated to com- mages across SKUs. “Problem
sented on a single screen. tions provider SIG expects mence at its India facility by the is companies give us all their
“This is our first partnership India to be among the top end of 2024. The Ahmedabad- SKUs and we have to stock for
and we are in talks with 11 more 10 markets globally and will based plant will cater to its retailers, who are also facing
potential partners in different invest around €100 million growing dairy and non-carbon- some storage issues,” he said.
markets for similar deals,” said (₹878.8 crore) to set up its first ated soft drink filler base in the Launch of multiple packs
Nagpal. “Almost everyone I plant here, its CEO Samuel country. means cost for transportation
met internationally is strug- Sigrist said on Wednesday. “The investment will be may go up, Patil said. “The
Tata Play managing director and chief executive Harit Nagpal. gling to make aggregator apps. The company, which made in a phased manner over rapid launch of new SKUs by
That’s why we thought of shar- entered into the Indian market the period of 2023-2025 to companies makes it increas-
would need one aggregator. So cial partnerships, recommen- ing the software architecture. in 2018, has witnessed a “phe- Samuel Sigrist, CEO, SIG. reach a production capacity of ingly challenging to manage
we started work on Binge five dation engines, subscription We can handle the hosting and nomenal growth” here, and up to 4 billion packs per inventory effectively. This is
years ago. We made mistakes management, and analytics, as technical infrastructure for a expects it to “play a very impor- and the growth opportunity annum. Subsequent invest- particularly challenging given
and corrected them and it took well as providing the software small fee, which is a fraction of tant role for us going forward”, here is amazing. India will, over ments are expected to increase the limited storage space avail-
us some time to perfect it. Now architecture, he added. what they would have to pay to he added. time, become a very, very siza- capacity up to 10 billion packs able. Retailers are also show-
we are in a posi- “We were keen build an app, while they can It is quite encouraged by the ble market price set. We are per annum,” the company said. ing reluctance to keep added
tion to offer this Binge offers its on an OTT aggre- focus on content and deals.” growth of the beverage indus- super excited,” he added. In the first phase, SIG would number of SKUs due to rising
platform as a ser- users access to 28 gation product as Tata Play will deal with only try in India, coupled with fac- However, he said, currently, use imported materials to man- complexity and potential con-
vice, and global national, regional a natural evolu- one player in any market, said tors like the growing economy, India is small right now but is ufacture its aseptic cartons but fusion among consumers.”
players can use it and global apps tion of our service Nagpal. In India, Binge offers income of the people and growing at a fast pace. More- in the second phase, it would Earlier this month, federa-
at a fraction of the and recognize the its users access to 28 national, packed food consumption, he over, with the new plant and source the raw materials tion members had met minis-
spanning 13
cost to launch an success of Tata regional and global apps span- said. growth of the beverage indus- locally, he added.SIG has try of public distribution seek-
aggregator app in languages Play Binge in this ning 13 languages, including When asked whether India try in India, it would scale up. installed 40 packaging ing standardizing of packaging
months,” Nagpal in India space as a model popular platforms Apple TV+, would figure in its top 10 mar- SIG on Wednesday laid the machines here and is working and categorizing products into
told Mint. to follow. We are Disney+ Hotstar, SonyLIV, Jio kets in mid-terms (around 5 foundation of its first aseptic with some of India’s leading four classes: entry pack, small
The company in advanced sta- Cinema and ZEE5. years) Sigrist said: “Easily. Our carton plant in India, where it is juice and dairy players, includ- pack, medium pack, and large
will look after the end-to-end ges to finalise our engagement Earlier this year, Tata Play, a five-year CAGR for the pack- investing €60 million (approx ing Amul, Parle, Coca-Cola, pack, to simplify management
development and deployment targeting go-to-market in less joint venture with Walt Disney aged dairy business is in kind of ₹525.98 crore) on capex as Dabur, Varun Beverages and of inventory, reduce complex-
opportunities, and will share than a year,” said Jane J Basas, got Securities and Exchange the high teens, around 15-17%.” machinery and around €40 ITC. It also lauded India’s eco- ity for retailers, and eliminate
its learnings with the partner president and chief executive Board of India’s nod to launch “We normally outgrow the million (₹351.36 crore) on the nomic environment, saying it is confusion arising from multi-
companies to forge commer- officer, Cignal TV. its initial public offering (IPO). market. We are the new entrant lease agreement for land and very “business friendly”. ple SKUs at similar price range.

‘Nestle investing in India’s evolving coffee culture to double growth’

Suneera Tandon nies. Edited excerpts. and we have been producing globe is 200 cups. So, it’s a really strong market leader- going to need more capacity. think the coffee shop culture
suneera.t@htlive.com coffee in India directly since strong business for us, and it is ship. So it’s a combination of Driven by a young population, itself helps create an interest.
NeW DeLHi Can you please elaborate then.The vast majority of the growing incredibly quickly at having the preferred brand in in both rural and urban as they The other thing is as a coffee-

‘
on the reach of Nestlé’s cof- production is made in India, double-digit. the market and that pre- are really getting into producing country, India has

D
avid Rennie, deputy
executive vice-presi-
dent and head of Nestlé
Coffee Brands, oversees its
global coffee business, includ-
ing Nescafe, Nespresso and
Starbucks. In an interview,
Rennie said India’s coffee mar-
ket is expanding with the com-
pany making market share
gains on account of launches
such as ready-to-drink cold
coffee and frappe mixes.
Coffee cafe culture in India
is transforming with more
consumers now turning to
speciality coffee and demand-
ing exotic brews from compa-
fee business? with Indian coffee, for Indian But in terms of potential ferred brand understand- the ability to create more jobs
Coffee for Nestlé is really consumers. We’ve announced we’ve really only just begun. It driving the ing what cof- and infrastructure around cof-
important; it’s a strategic drive last year, a further investment is clear Indian consumers are category. The main focus is not fee is about. fee growing. It is exciting.
category. Last year, we sold 23 in that factory of 110 million getting a taste for coffee, they Will coffee so much Starbucks but It’s the taste of Will the Starbucks associa-
billion Swiss Francs worth of Swiss Francs to increase the enjoy it, it’s a category gener- emerge as a Nescafe. We believe a young gen- tion extend to India, as the
coffee, which is capacity of that ating great interest. larger busi- eration, and cafe business is with Tata
Nescafe has strong
roughly a quar-
ter of Nestlé’s
m INTERVIEW f2025. actory by
By 2025,
Where is the Indian coffee
business stand vis-vis other
ness in India not just hot
any projec- potential. This is where coffee, it’s also
Consumer Products Ltd?
Today, Tatas have a license
global turn- we will have global markets? tions? our main focus is. cold coffee. It for the cafes and a license for
over. We have operations in all that capacity. The majority is India is very clearly within We abso- is partially some of the products. For us,
David Rennie
Nestle’s markets, roughly one going to be for Nescafe and One way to think about how our top 20 (coffee) markets in lutely do see a Head, coffee brands, and driven by cof- it is only a matter of time and
in seven cups of coffee drunk Nescafe Sunrise. developed a category is, is to the globe and it’s growing very huge growth deputy EVP, Nestlé fee shops, we will definitely be building
globally, is going to be a Nes- While 25% of your global look at average cup consump- fast, moving up in the rankings potential. there’s lots of our business out in time. The
cafe. One in every four cups of revenues come from coffee, tion per consumer. In India every single year. We’ve been That’s why cold coffee main focus is not so much
coffee drunk in India, is a Nes- it’s your smallest segment today it is around 30 cups per growing double-digit for many we are investing to double the and exotic coffees. With Starbucks but Nescafe. We
cafe. In 1963, we started selling in India. Is India under-de- annum. years. We’re growing in abso- size of the factory. I don’t want experimentation the youth are believe Nescafe has strong
in India. Our factory in Nan- veloped for the coffee busi- To give you a sense of where lute size. We’re also growing speculate where we’ll be in five getting into the category and potential. This is where our
jangud was opened in 1989 ness? that fits, the average for the market share, and have taken or 10 years, but we know we’re it’s definitely going to grow. I main focus is.
08 ThurSDay, 28 SepTember 2023
New Delhi GLOBAL LIVEMINT.COM

m MINT SHORTS
North Korea to expel US soldier
UBS, Credit Suisse face Iraq wedding fire
kills more than 100,
who bolted across border in July
North Korea will expel the US Army soldier who bolted across the
border from South Korea in July, but didn’t give any indication on
how it would arrange his return. “The relevant organ of the DPRK
probe over compliance probe announced
decided to expel Travis King, a soldier of the US Army who illegally Reuters
intruded into the territory of the DPRK,” the official Korean Cen- feedback@livemint.com
tral News Agency said Wednesday, referring to North Korea by its Mosul
formal name. BLOOMBERG US is probing compliance failures that helped Russian clients evade curbs
A
fire ripped through a
packed wedding hall
Binance exits Russia with sale Bloomberg in northern Iraq late
feedback@livemint.com on Tuesday, killing more than
to just-launched exchange 100 people in a Christian

T
REUTERS
he US department of justice town that had survived
(DoJ) has stepped up its probe Islamic State occupation as
into Credit Suisse Group and authorities announced an
UBS Group AG over suspected investigation into the blaze.
compliance failures that allowed Fire fighters searched the
Russian clients to evade sanctions, accord- charred skeleton of the build- Hundreds of people were at
ing to people familiar with the situation. ing in Qaraqosh, also known the wedding celebration. REUTERS
What began as a series of subpoenas sent as Hamdaniya, through
to a range of banks early this year has devel- Wednesday morning and ing, Interior Minister Abdul
oped into a full-scale investigation focusing bereaved relatives gathered Amir al-Shammari said,
on Credit Suisse, said the people, who outside a morgue in the according to state media.
requested anonymity to speak about an nearby city of Mosul, wailing A video of the event, posted
ongoing inquiry. The DoJ has briefed and rocking in distress. “This on social media but not yet
Binance said it exited its Russia business by selling it to Com- US-based lawyers for UBS about Credit was not a wedding. This was verified by Reuters, appeared
mEX, a crypto exchange that says it officially launched on Suisse’s alleged exposure to sanctions vio- hell,” said Mariam Khedr, cry- to show the flares suddenly
Tuesday. “As we look toward the future, we recognise that lations since UBS acquired its smaller rival ing and hitting herself as she catching a glittering ceiling
operating in Russia is not compatible with Binance’s compli- in June, the people said. The DOJ is also Along with Credit Suisse’s business, UBS also inherited Credit Suisse’s legal woes, the waited for officials to return decoration that burst into
ance strategy,” Noah Perlman, Binance’s chief compliance looking into possible compliance failures at main cause of its collapse in March. REUTERS the bodies of her daughter flames, as sounds of excite-
officer, wrote in a blog post Wednesday. The firm didn’t pro- UBS, one of them said. Rana Yakoub, 27, and three ment turned rapidly to panic.
vide financial terms. BLOOMBERG The probe is still at an early stage and Internally, DoJ officials saw the takeover Russian holdings and the earlier decision to young grandchildren, the Another video that Reuters
may not result in charges or a settlement, as an opportunity to advance the Credit unfreeze some assets in a high-profile cor- youngest aged just eight has not yet verified showed a
the people said. Still, it comes at a delicate Suisse investigation, two of the people said. ruption case with links to the Kremlin. months. couple dancing in wedding
‘Elon Musk’s X disabled feature for time for the Zurich-based bank, which is Investigators have taken requests for Before the invasion of Ukraine, Credit Survivors said clothes as burn-
absorbing thousands of employees from information to UBS directly, rather than Suisse was well known for catering to hundreds of peo- Nineveh province ing material
reporting electoral misinformation’ Credit Suisse. Along with Credit Suisse’s routing through official diplomatic chan- wealthy Russians, managing more than ple were at the begins dropping
deputy
Elon Musk’s X disabled a feature that let users report misinforma- business, which boosted its wealth man- nels, which can be slower, according to two $60 billion of their assets at its peak. By the wedding celebra- governor Hassan to the floor.
tion about elections, a research organisation said on agement business by almost a third to over other people familiar with the case. For- time of the invasion in February 2022, that tion, which fol- al-Allaf told The interior
Wednesday, throwing fresh concern about false claims spreading $4 trillion, UBS also inherited Credit mally, any requests for help from foreign number had fallen to $33 billion, still 50% lowed an earlier ministry said it
just before major US and Australian votes. After introducing a prosecutors must be funnelled through the more than UBS, despite the latter’s larger
Reuters 113 had issued four
Suisse’s legal woes, the main cause of its church service,
feature in 2022 for users to report a post they considered collapse in March. Swiss Federal Office of Jus- wealth management business. and the fire people had been arrest warrants
misleading about politics, X in the past week removed the The DoJ has asked for information about tice, except in rare cases of The DoJ has UBS retained Credit Suisse’s began about an confirmed dead for the owners of
“politics” category from its drop-down menu in every how the banks handled the accounts of cooperation such as the joint asked for top banker for the Russian hour into the the wedding hall,
jurisdiction but the European Union, said the researcher Reset sanctioned clients over the past several US-Swiss raids on FIFA in information business, Babak Dastmaltschi, event when flares state media
Tech Australia. REUTERS years but has not requested interviews with 2015. The FOJ says that to about how the even as it let other senior exec- ignited a ceiling decoration as reported, and President
executives or staff yet, one of the people date it’s received no requests utives go in the takeover. the bride and groom danced. Abdul Latif Rashid called for
banks handled
said. The probe covers both restrictions related to Credit Suisse, UBS US investigations into Nineveh province deputy an investigation.
Microsoft says Apple used Bing imposed after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Russian sanctions. the accounts of sanctions violations have in governor Hassan al-Allaf told “We saw the fire pulsating,
in 2022 and previous rounds put in place Privately, US officials have sanctioned clients the past resulted in large fines. Reuters 113 people had been coming out of the hall. Those
offer as Google ‘bargaining chip’ following its 2014 annexation of Crimea, expressed frustration at what In 2014, BNP Paribas SA in confirmed dead. The head of who managed got out and
A Microsoft Corp. executive said the firm has tried for years to another person said. More than a thousand they see as Switzerland not 2014 pleaded guilty to U.S. the province’s Red Crescent those who didn’t got stuck,”
displace Alphabet Inc.’s Google as the default web browser wealthy Russians have been blacklisted by doing enough to enforce sanctions on Rus- sanctions violations related to Sudan and branch said the death toll was said Imad Yohana, a 34-year-
on iPhones, but that Apple Inc. never seriously considered the US over the last decade. sia and combat money laundering that’s agreed to pay $8.97 billion. not final but that it “exceeds old who escaped the inferno.
switching to Microsoft’s Bing and was content to use it as a UBS shares were down 3.4% as of 1:26pm helping the Kremlin keep its economy The current probe is only the latest in the hundreds injured and dozens Video from a Reuters corre-
“bargaining chip” with the search giant. “Apple is making in Zurich, having initially declined 7.9%, humming despite the restrictions imposed US involving Credit Suisse. The Justice killed”. spondent at the site showed
more money on Bing existing than Bing does,” Mikhail Parakhin, the most since March. by the US and its allies over its invasion of Department is still investigating whether the The fire tore through a firefighters clambering over
the head of Microsoft’s advertising and web services, testified A spokeswoman for UBS declined to Ukraine. bank continued to help US clients hide assets large events hall after flares the charred wreckage of the
during the US government’s antitrust trial against Google comment. A spokesperson for the DoJ The US points to Switzerland’s refusal to from authorities, eight years after the bank were lit during the celebra- building, shining lights over
in Washington. BLOOMBERG declined to comment. join a multilateral task force chasing illicit paid a $2.6 billion tax-evasion settlement. tion, causing a fire in the ceil- smouldering ruins.

I F¹FFÊ»F¹F ³F¦FS ´FFd»FI d³F¦F¸F, B³QüS PwC Aus gave clients confidential tax info
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102-103 ´FFd»FI F ´»FFþF (dõ°Fe¹F ¨FS¯F) E¸F.Me.E¨F. I ¸´FFC¯O, B³QüS REUTERS
Reuters panies. However, the 17-page ing Uber and Facebook.
Email ID : rddc-imc@yahoo.co.in
feedback@livemint.com document reveals a series of Confidential information
d³FdUQF-dUÄFd´°F sydney previously unreported leaks by was also shared with PwC staff
other partners, many who outside of Australia as shown in
d³FdUQF dU. Ii . : -03/¹Fûþ³FF/2023-24 dQ³FFaI : 22.09.2023

P
wC Australia gave multi- remain unnamed, from gov- a cache of 144 pages of PwC
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Australian government tax digital currencies and the mentioning a “north American
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received leaked government leaked a confi- at the firm in 2015 day, the global
1 2 3 4 5 6
tax plans. dential Treasury gave two clients PwC network
1. 2023_UAD_ I F¹FFI »´F ¹Fûþ³FF 2.0 IZ 11 ¸FFW ÷ . 30,000/- 04.10.2023 A former partner at the “big paper on a tax confidential info published a short
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SFdVF ÷ . about the start
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10,76,25,005/- about the start date of a new tax information was confidential. Economic Coop- date of a new tax law firm Linklat-
WbE AM»F ¦FZM °FI ÀFOÞ I I F law targeting multinational eration and law for MNCs ers found no staff
dUI FÀF I F¹FÊ I S³FF companies, PwC Australia said clients in the report, citing confi- Development to outside Australia
2. 2023_UAD_ I F¹FFI »´F ¹Fûþ³FF 2.0 IZ 08 ¸FFW ÷ . 20,000/- 04.10.2023 on Wednesday. dentiality. The firm says clients colleagues and an used any confi-
310941_1 A³°F¦FÊ°F ¦FFa²Fe ³F¦FS ¸FZ³F SûOÞ SFdVF ÷ . “Various other updates we were not told the information unnamed client. dential information for com-
6,48,34,431/-
can chat about if you get a was confidential. First revealed in January by mercial gain and that most staff
I F dUI FÀF I F¹FÊ I S³FF ÷ . 3,24,175/- moment,” the former partner The revelations are part of a tax regulators and stoked since outside of Australia did not
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unnamed multinational client. by the firm in response to a tion, the scandal has forced out was confidential. However, six
UZ¶FÀFFBÊM ´FS We dI ¹FF þF¹FZ¦FFÜ ´FȱFI ÀFZ ÀF¸FF¨FFS ´FÂF ¸FZÔ ´FiI FVF³F ³FWeÔ dI ¹FF þFUZ¦FFÜ Reuters in July revealed one national scandal first triggered 12 partners, including the chief individuals, who were not
A²FeÃF¯F ¹FaÂFe (¹Fûþ³FF) of the clients PwC Australia by the revelation a former part- executive, prompted public named and whose roles were
³F¦FS ´FFd»FI d³F¦F¸F, B³QüS shared confidential informa- ner had leaked confidential tax and private sector clients to not given, “should have raised
tion with was Google but the documents to colleagues to freeze ties and entangled cli- questions” about whether the
company declined to name any drum up work with global com- ents other than Google, includ- information was confidential.

3 astronauts return after a year in space

AP month. Their replacements

Have fun with facts finally arrived nearly two

feedback@livemint.com
weeks ago.

A
NASA astronaut and “It’s good to be home,” Rubio
two Russian cosmo- said after being pulled from the
nauts returned to Earth capsule. Rubio, 47, an Army

on Sundays on Wednesday after being

stuck in space for just over a
year. American Frank Rubio set
a record for the longest US
spaceflight—a result of the
doctor and helicopter pilot,
said at a news conference last
week that he never would have
agreed to a full year in space if
asked at the outset. He ended
extended stay. up missing important family
Catch the latest column of The trio landed in a remote
area of Kazakhstan, descending
milestones including the oldest
of his four children finishing
in a Soyuz capsule that was her first year at the US Naval

A
rushed up as a replacement
after their original ride was hit
by space junk and lost all its
coolant while docked to the
International Space Station.
What should have been a
180-day mission turned into a
A quiz on the week’s development. 371-day stay. Rubio spent more
than two weeks longer in space
than Mark Vande Hei, who held
hindustantimes htTweets www.hindustantimes.com NASA’s previous endurance
record for a single spaceflight.
Russia holds the world
American Frank Rubio set a record for the longest US spaceflight
—a result of the extended stay.
record of 437 days, set in the
mid-1990s.
The Soyuz capsule that
brought Rubio and cosmo-
nauts Sergey Prokopyev and
Dmitri Petelin back was a
replacement launched in Feb-
ruary. Russian engineers sus-
pect a piece of space junk
pierced the radiator of their
AP
original capsule late last year,
midway through what should
have been a six-month mission.
Engineers worried that without
cooling, the capsule’s electron-
ics and any occupants could
overheat to dangerous levels,
so the craft returned empty.
There wasn’t another Soyuz
to launch a fresh crew until this
Academy and another heading
off to West Point.
Rubio had said the psycho-
logical aspect of spending so
long in space was tougher than
he expected. He may hold on to
this record for a while. NASA
has no plans as of now for more
yearlong missions. It was the
first spaceflight for Rubio and
Petelin. Prokopyev, 48, an
engineer and pilot, has now
pulled two long station stints.
LIVEMINT.COM NEWS WRAP ThurSDay, 28 SepTember 2023
New Delhi 09

QUOTES
Alakh Pandey Daren Tang Elizabeth Warren
Vivek Ramaswamy Founder, PhysicsWallah Chief, WIPO Senator, US
US Presidential candidate No one has really used AI at There has been a Amazon has abused its
The next US President scale in edtech. It will be drop in the invest- monopoly power to crush
needs to do at the fed- great if we can do that. We ment environ- competition and boost profits
eral government what have the scale. We won’t ment...Venture capi- at the expense of consumers
Elon Musk did at have to train AI on OpenAI— tal funding is becom- and small businesses. FTC has
Twitter and release the we will train it on Physic- ing more and more a responsibility to enforce our
“state action files.” sWallah’s own datasets. scarce. antitrust laws.

Aditya Birla Fashion THE SMILE SAYS IT ALL DBS India’s MD

takes TCNS control Chopra resigns

A V
ditya Birla Fashion Retail Ltd (ABFRL) eteran banker Sandeep Chopra, has
has completed the acquisition of a 51% resigned as a managing director at DBS
stake in TCNS Clothing to become a Group Holdings Ltd’s India unit,
promoter of the women’s apparel brand. according to people familiar with the matter.
“The company has acquired 51% of the Chopra was part of institutional banking
expanded share capital of TCNS, thereby group where Rajat Verma joined as managing
acquiring control over TCNS,” ABFRL said in a director and country head in June.
late night regulatory filing on Tuesday. Chopra is on gardening leave and is
TCNS has become a subsidiary of the exploring other career opportunities, said the
company, and will also be a material subsidiary people who asked not to be identified because
of the company in accordance with Sebi listing the matter is private.
regulations, it added. Chopra resigned from the post a few weeks
On 5 May, Aditya Birla Group firm had ago, the people said.
announced that it will acquire a majority stake When contacted, the Singapore-based
in TCNS Clothing, in a deal worth ₹1,650 crore. lender’s India spokesperson declined to
As per the deal, it acquired TCNS Clothing’s comment.
founding promoter’s stake through an SPA Chopra joined DBS in October 2016, after
(share purchase agreement), followed by an serving for nearly seven years at RBS as head
open offer. TCNS reported a turnover of global network banking, according to his
₹1,201.59 crore for the financial year ended on Linkedin profile. BLOOMBERG
31 March 2023. PTI

Indian shooter Sift Kaur Samra (left) and Ashi Chouksey after the finals of the women’s 50m rifle 3 positions event at the 19th Asian Games in
Hangzhou, China, on Wednesday. Samra won the gold and Chouksey settled for a bronze. PTI

Income tax officials inspected laptops of Lenovo

GST from October on imported Revenue from operations was at ₹17,042 crore in
FY23, highest in the last five financial years. MINT
employees during the visit to offices.

Tax officials visit

BLOOMBERG

online services for personal use Škoda India’s net

up by 49% in FY23
Lenovo offices
Š
koda Auto Volkswagen India posted a

I
ncome tax officials on Wednesday visited a
factory of Chinese computer maker Lenovo
in the union territory of Puducherry and
one of its offices in Bengaluru city as part of an
inquiry, two sources told Reuters.
The officials inspected laptops of Lenovo
employees during the visit, one of the sources
48.6% rise in its standalone net profit at
Content streaming platforms, social media firms and search engines come under tax net ₹309.5 crore in the fiscal ended 31 March
2023 riding on strong revenue growth,
according to financial data accessed by
Gireesh Chandra Prasad government falls on the exporter of service. ment, state government, a government authority, business intelligence platform Tofler.
gireesh.p@livemint.com Under the earlier regime, in addition to the tax or individuals for purpose other than business The company had posted a net profit of
nEw dElhI exemption on import of these services for per- was exempt. However, now from 1 October, this ₹208.34 crore in the fiscal ended 31 March

F
said.
They also tried to contact Lenovo’s senior
management during and after the visit as part
of the inquiry, the person added.
Lenovo, which confirmed the visit, said it
was “co-operating with the authorities and
will provide all possible support required”.
“We adhere strictly to all applicable laws,
regulations, and reporting requirements in
every jurisdiction in which we do business,” it
said.
The reason for the visit was not
immediately clear.
Earlier in the day, the income tax
department officials conducted searches at
the premises of Apple supplier Flex Ltd in
Tamil Nadu, a source said on Wednesday.
REUTERS
sonal use, the liability to remit the tax to the gov- exemption will not be applicable for OIDAR servi- 2022. Revenue from operations was at ₹17,042
rom 1 October, imports of online services ernment was on the consumer if he was a GST ces, making it taxable. “This amendment specifies crore in FY23, highest in the last five financial
for personal use from offshore digital ser- registered person importing the service for busi- that the said exemption entry will no longer be years, according to the data.
vices companies such as software sellers, ness purposes. applicable to In its regulatory filing, the company said the
content streaming platforms, social Given that it is diffi- OIDAR services rise in revenue was due to increase in sales
media firms and search engines hosting cult for the tax The move is expected to help raise starting from 1 Octo- volumes in the domestic market. This was
advertisements will be subject to 18% Integrated authorities in India revenue for the government, given ber, 2023. Conse- mainly due to the launch of new models under
Goods and Services Tax (IGST), according to a to figure out who is
finance ministry order implementing a set of tax importing these ser- these firms are significant sellers of quently, OIDAR ser-
vices provided to
the India 2.0 project.
In terms of net profit, in the last five fiscals
changes introduced in the budget this year. vices for personal services to Indian customers the aforementioned the company posted its highest in FY21 at
The notification gives effect to the significant use and who is using persons are now lia- ₹756.97 crore. It was at ₹261.39 crore in FY20
changes to the tax regime covering these non-res- it for business pur- ble to taxation,” said and ₹198.06 crore in FY19. PTI
ident digital service providers called ‘Online poses, making the exporting firm liable to make Agarwal. The move is expected to help raise reve-
Information Database Access and Retrieval the payment in the case of personal users makes nue for the government given that social media
(OIDAR).’ In the Finance Act, the government had tax collection easier. platforms, online search engines and other digital
removed a tax exemption for import of OIDAR
services for personal use and now the onus of col-
Saurabh Agarwal, Tax Partner at EY explained economy firms rendering services to Indian cus-
that earlier these services from entities located in tomers in a big way from their offshore subsidiar-
Share of elderly to
lecting and making the tax payment to the Indian non-taxable territory rendered to Central govern- ies are covered by this change.
rise in India: UNFPA

E
lderly population in India is expanding at
Sick pensioners to an unprecedented rate and could surpass
India 6G vision accepted by UN’s ITU the children’s population by mid-century,
get doorstep help a new UNFPA report said, underlining that the
young India will turn into a rapidly ageing
ITU is responsible for developing society in the coming decades.

T
he Centre has asked all pension
disbursing banks to depute doorstep
executives to help bedridden and
hospitalized pensioners submit their life
certificates.
An order issued by the department of
pension and pensioners’ welfare (DoPPW) also
asked all banks to create awareness about the
convenience of obtaining the life certificate
digitally by using the face authentication
technology by super senior pensioners (those
aged 80 and above).
All pensioners have to give a life certificate
(proof that they are alive) annually to continue
receiving pension.
PM Modi and minister Ashwini Vaishnaw at
the release ‘6G Vision’ document earlier. PTI
international mobile telecommunication
standards. “In the current meeting,
despite resistance and attempts to reverse
our progress by few member states, the
department of telecommunications was
able to successfully include ‘Ubiquitous
Connectivity’ and ratify the framework
document,” an official statement said on
Wednesday.
The proposal was accepted by ITU
Study group (SG-5) meeting in Geneva
held on 25-26 September 2023.
IMT 2030, also known as 6G, is being
developed by Working Party 5D of ITU-R
Study Group 5. India in its 6G vision
Lakshmi Mittal said at the ‘Vibrant Gujarat’
summit that the Hazira work is progressing..
Hazira project to
India has one of the highest populations of
adolescents and young people in the world.
At the national level, the share of the elderly
(60+ years) population is projected to increase
from 10.1% in 2021 to 15% in 2036 to 20.8% in
2050, according to the UNFPA’s ‘India Ageing
Report 2023’.
“By the end of the century, the elderly will
constitute over 36% of the total population of
the country. Sharp growth in the elderly
population is observed from 2010 onwards
MINT along with a decline in the age group of below
15 years, indicating rapidity of ageing in India,”
the report said. PTI

I go on stream by ’26
There are about 6.98 million central
government pensioners.
In view of the digital life certificate through
face authentication technology, it is now
possible for every citizen to submit a digital life
certificate either from home using an Android
smartphone or at the bank branch, said the
ndia’s vision to have ubiquitous
coverage under 6G technology has
been accepted by UN body ITU’s Study
Group in its meeting held at Geneva—a
move that is expected to reduce the cost of
deployment of the next generation
technology.
document, released by Prime Minister
Narendra Modi, has proposed 6G
technology implementation should be
Google quake alert
A
affordable, sustainable and ubiquitous. rcelorMittal executive chairman Lakshmi
This is the first time India has had such
a significant impact on influencing the
N Mittal on Wednesday expressed
confidence that AMNS India’s Hazira system now in India
ITU. PTI project, which is under expansion, will be

order dated 25 September.
Kerala floods movie 2018 is India’s official entry to Oscars ‘24
I
PTI commissioned by 2026.
In October last year, ArcelorMittal’s arm
AMNS India had stated that it will invest
₹60,000 crore to scale up capacity of its steel
plant at Hazira to 15 million tonnes (MT).
“We have full confidence that with the
cooperation of the Centre and Gujarat
nternet major Google will roll out an
earthquake alert service in India that works
using sensors in Android smartphones to
detect and estimate the intensity of
earthquakes, the company said on Wednesday.
Google has introduced “Android Earthquake
Alerts System” in India in consultation with the

S
urvival drama 2018: Everyone is a Hero, based on the Kerala floods that
year, is India’s official entry to the Academy Awards 2024, the Film
Federation of India announced on Wednesday. Addressing a press
conference, Girish Kasaravalli, noted filmmaker and chairperson of the
selection committee, said the 16-member jury unanimously selected the
Malayalam film to represent the country.
Lead star Tovino Thomas, who is currently in Amsterdam for the
Septimius Awards where he won the best Asian Actor trophy for 2018, said it
was time for celebration for the team. “I was very happy last night and woke
up even happier to this exciting news as our film 2018 has been selected as
India’s official entry (to Oscars). We worked in extreme conditions but it’s all
paying off. This movie is now getting international acclaim. It’s great,”
Thomas told PTI over phone from Amsterdam.
The 96th Academy Awards are scheduled to take place on 10 March 2024
in Los Angeles.
government, we will be able to commission the
project by 2026,” Mittal said here while
speaking at the celebrations of 20 years of
‘Vibrant Gujarat’ summit.
Hazira expansion project is moving at a fast
pace and over 20,000 people are involved in
the project construction, he said. “It is our
target to double our production capacity in the
first phase and then triple...we will also make
advance products for technology,” he said,
adding it would help India reduce imports and
become self-reliant. He also said that because
of the ‘Vibrant Gujarat’ summit, different states
are organising investor summits and this is
PTI Survival drama 2018 is based on the Kerala floods that year. AFP helping India attract foreign investments. PTI
National Disaster Management Authority
(NDMA) and the National Seismology Centre
(NSC).
“Today, in consultation with the National
Disaster Management Authority and the
National Seismology Centre, we’re introducing
the Android Earthquake Alerts System in India.
Through this launch, we strive to provide
Android users automatic early warning alerts
when there is an earthquake in their area,”
Google said in a blog.
The system takes the help of tiny
accelerometers present in Android
smartphones that can act as mini
seismometers. PTI
10 ThurSDay, 28 SepTember 2023
New Delhi LONG STORY LIVEMINT.COM

THE SHIFTING SANDS

oF Food PrIceS
Inflation pain points have moved fast, from wheat to rice to pulses. What will surprise next?

Prakash Gujjar, a farmer from Ujjain, Madhya Pradesh, planted soybeans in 25 acres. The crop weathered a dry spell in August and is rotting root up following intense rains in September. SAYANTAN BERA/MINT

Sayantan Bera Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act.
sayantan.bera@livemint.com
MANDSAUr/UjjAiN
The south-west monsoon, which lasts
from June to September and waters crops
planted during the Kharif season, has
A demANd shock? were 44% higher,” Sharma added. lives, parts of Punjab and Haryana going
mint
E rratic rains and government meas-
ures to keep food inflation in
check—which include export curbs on
SHORT
STORY
Crop damage is not the only reason
which is denting farm incomes. A recent
report by Delhi-based think tank Icrier
under the water, and deficit rains in rice
growing Bihar, Jharkhand, parts of West
Bengal and Uttar Pradesh.

F
rom a distance, the field appeared been wayward, the farmers of Malwa com- rice, wheat and onions— could end up calculated that wheat farmers lost about Overall rice production could take a hit
like a post-impressionist land- plained. It arrived late in June, rained a bit dampening farm incomes and consumer WHAT ₹40,000 crore following government of 10 million tonnes or close to a tenth of
scape. Shades of yellowish green in July, and disappeared in August. Then, demand in rural India in the festive steps to cool consumer prices (via open Kharif output, said S. Chandrasekaran, a
on a patchy canvas of charred in September, heavy rains in parts of months of October and November. Yet, Uneven rains have dented the market sales ahead of harvest in April this farm trade policy analyst. “How prices
brown. 19-year-old Kamlesh, a Malwa drowned crops. The same beans consumer food prices are likely to stay Kharif outlook for rice, pulses, and year). Rice growers can face a similar situ- move post-harvest will provide a clearer
skinny college student, uprooted a soy- were damaged, first by a drought and then firm ahead of crucial state elections—in oilseeds. Prices of some food ation when they harvest the crop in Octo- picture on the extent of damage,” he added.
bean plant and crushed a few pods with his due to excess rains. Telangana, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattis- items may not soften despite ber, the authors warned. So far, Karnataka is the only state to
fingers. The beans inside were discol- “I planted 25 acres of soybeans with a garh, and Rajasthan—and general elec- government measures like export declare a drought and seek central relief.
oured—pale and pockmarked instead of new long duration variety which could tions scheduled next year. curbs and stock limits on traders. The NexT froNT The state has estimated farm sector losses
the smooth yellow, much smaller than partly deal with the rain deficit. But it went
their usual size and fewer in numbers per under the water this month,” said Prakash
pod—the consequence of a prolonged dry Gujjar, a farmer from Silodiya village in
Last year, the spike in prices began with
edible oils (following the Ukraine war) and
wheat (which was damaged due to a heat AND
F or now, deficit rains in parts of Karna-
taka, Maharashtra and Madhya Pra-
due to deficit rains at ₹28,000 crore.

desh have opened a new front in India’s ‘No mood To speNd’

spell which began in August and lasted for Ujjain district, standing next to his slushy
over a month. The beans were ready for field. A mild stench of rotting plants hung
harvest but would yield less than a fifth of in the evening air. Gujjar’s loss due to the
wave). Then it spread to rice due to a smaller
crop in 2022 and a lower anticipated har-
vest this year. Now, prices of pulses are
While Karnataka and Jharkhand
are battling an acute water
battle to contain food inflation: rising pri-
ces of pulses like tur (pigeon pea), moong D ilip Patidar, who farms 16 acres in
Budha village, Mandsaur, said he
(green gram) and urad (black gram). The planted a mix of crops this Kharif season—
a normal crop. They will sell at a discount downpour was a staggering ₹10 lakh. soaring due to lower planting and losses fol- shortfall, excess rains and floods expected crop loss due to uneven rains is soybeans, black gram and ground nut—in
in the wholesale market and not even pay “Not a single bean can be harvested lowing erratic rains. Oilseeds could be have damaged crops in many on top of a 5% drop in area planted by a bid to manage price risks. If bean prices
for the labour costs of harvest. from this plot. And I will not be able to next—if a significant drop in production other states. Untimely rains during farmers, compared to last year. crashed, he could recover the losses from
A while ago, he sat next to his elder sis- pay the interest on the crop loan which and higher demand from India firms up the harvest season are also a risk. Over the past two years, farmers lost black gram. But scanty rains impacted all
ter, Pooja, on a rough cement floor inside will be due soon,” he said. Yet, Gujjar will international prices. India imports about interest in planting pulses due to a crash in three crops, with yield losses hovering
a bare room lined with naked bricks. Their have to arrange for workers to uproot the 60% of its domestic consumption and oil prices, said Laxman Wange, a farmer from between 75-80%.
unfinished house, which is yet to get the plants and clear the field, spending about processors are estimating record imports in SO Beed district in Marathwada region of “I have lost around ₹4 lakh this season.
final coat of plaster and paint, is in Barod ₹3,000 per acre. Else, the unharvested the oil year 2022-23 (which lasts from Maharashtra. That was largely because of Some of us went to meet district officials
village in Mandsaur, Madhya Pradesh. beans will germinate when the winter November of one year to October of next). A hit to farm incomes can take the a liberal trade policy of allowing duty free asking them to do a crop loss survey. But
Pooja, 23, struggled to hold back her crop of wheat and chickpeas are planted India’s key soybean producing states sheen off festive season sales for imports of tur and black gram—from no one showed up. Many farmers have
tears as she clasped a a month later. saw similar, below-average levels of rain- businesses. Families in rural Malawi, Mozambique, already harvested soy-
framed photograph of Farmers can only fall in 2017 and production fell by 24% that areas are likely to postpone and Myanmar. However, beans and black gram.
her father. Her voice In July, food inflation soared expect divine blessings year, US-based Gro Intelligence warned in purchase of big-ticket items like as India is the largest So far, Karnataka is the only On what basis will we get
quivered as she spoke. to a three year high of 11.5% (for not giving up) but a note earlier this month. It added that bikes and consumer durables. producer and consumer state to declare a drought. our crop insurance
Kamlesh was quiet. not any profit this sea- adverse climate can lead to lower palm oil of pulses in the world, claims?” Patidar asked.
After graduating from led by higher prices of son, quipped another yields in South East Asia, the largest sup- cooling domestic prices The state has estimated Patidar, who also runs
college, Pooja was pre- vegetables, cereals, pulses farmer who stood next to plier of edible oils for India. eased to 9.9% in August. But data pub- by allowing imports has farm sector losses due a store selling farm and
paring for a position in the Gujjar. A little distance A persistent firmness in food prices, lished by the consumer affairs ministry limited legroom. irrigation equipment—
state police department. and milk; it eased to away, a thresher—which besides chipping away household earnings, show prices continue to be sticky. As on 25 An added challenge is to deficit rains at part of his income diver-
Her father, 45-year-old separates beans from the can impact the bottom line of businesses September, prices of tur (pigeon peas), a that one pulse variety sification strategy—
Jagdish Dhangar, was 9.9% in August. stalk—groaned. The which include staples and packaged food popular kharif pulse, were 35% higher cannot be easily ₹28,000 crore. added that small grow-
worried the family did not machine repeatedly got makers as well as quick service restaurants. year on year. Rice, wheat flour and onions replaced by another due ers dependent solely on
have enough money to get Pooja married. stuck due to the moisture laden stalks it Repeated climate shocks to rural incomes were costlier by 11%, 6% and 42%, respec- to dietary preferences. One cannot agriculture can barely stay afloat. The
Five acres of soybean were lost to a drought. was fed with. The beans popped out of the will also hurt demand for fast-moving con- tively, compared to last year. A major relief replace the tur dal (grown during Kharif) markets are wild and so is the weather. “I
There were debts to repay. machine, shrivelled, loaded as it were with sumer goods companies as well as con- for consumers were edible oil prices, used to make sambar, a staple dish con- had stored onions (harvested in April)
On the evening of 4 September, Dhan- mud particles. And the stalk used as cattle sumer durables makers. A surge in food pri- which were lower by 16-24% year-on-year. sumed across southern states, with the hoping for a better price. But the govern-
gar had tea and stepped out of home. The fodder had to be thrown away as they were ces reduced footfall and pushed fashion Cereal inflation is likely to persist due to winter harvest of chickpeas. ment imposed an export tax (of 40%, as
family kept looking for him through the heavily soiled. outlets to offer steep discounts across malls the 7% hike in minimum support price of “We can still hope to harvest some tur in retail prices firmed up) and I had to sell the
night and found him at the farm, next Soybeans, the largest Kharif oilseed, has in several cities, Reuters reported in August. paddy and some yield losses due to uneven November (which is a six-month long crop). produce at a loss,” he said.
morning. He had hung himself from a seen heavy damage in top growing states rains, said Pushan Sharma, director at Crisil But soybeans are in bad shape,” Wange At Patidar’s modest shop selling pumps
mango tree. of Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra. But No wiNNers Research. Then there is an added risk of said. He added that repeated crop losses and sprinklers, located next to the Pipliya
Part of the fertile and prosperous consumer edible oil prices are unlikely to
Malwa belt, farm suicides are rare in firm up immediately due to the steady
Mandsaur. The district is known for the influx of cheap imported oils. However,
F or most parts, high domestic food pri-
ces have been driven by repeated cli-
mate shocks—drought, dry spells, heat
freak rains at harvest time crimping output.
With tomato prices climbing down
from the July highs and the export curb on
have pushed small farmers into a debt trap. mandi, a wholesale market in Mandsaur,
Between January and August this year, sales are down by 40% compared to the
close to 1,800 farmers from Maharashtra year before. When there is no water in the
wide variety of crops grown—soybean, the poultry industry may face a shortfall waves, and erratic rains. The crisis has no onions in place, vegetable prices are committed suicide, official data shows. wells, sprinklers are of no use.
pulses, wheat, groundnut, mustard, spi- and higher prices for soymeal—the high real winners: while the farmer is ham- unlikely to spring a surprise. But inflation Much of this death toll (685) is concentrated For the past few months, Patidar’s son,
ces, fruits like oranges and pomegran- protein leftover of the oil extraction pro- mered by a lower harvest, the consumer in pulses will likely be a sore point. in the drought hit Marathwada region. studying at a dental college in the state cap-
ates, and vegetables. cess, which is used as an animal feed. This, pays a steep price. The government scram- “Overall, farm incomes may improve by After a parched August, the driest in ital Bhopal, has been pestering his father
Mandsaur also supplies legal opium, in turn, may lead to an increase in con- bles to find a solution by slashing import 3-5% but how that translates into consump- over a century, the overall monsoon defi- for a bike. “But I cannot afford to splurge.
which is used to make morphine, a potent sumer prices of poultry meat and eggs. duties, and imposing export curbs and tion is not certain. The K-shaped recovery cit (1 June to 26 September) has narrowed Kharif is sunk, and Rabi (winter crop of
pain reliever. When crops fail, some who All this is irrelevant for Kamlesh. “From stock limits (to check hoarding by traders). in consumption (post-covid) is continuing. to 6% when compared to the 50-year-av- wheat and chickpeas) is under a cloud. The
grow opium (with a license) sell poppy next season, we will lease out the land,” In July, food inflation soared to a three- For instance, (aggregate) two-wheeler sales erage. But the lopsided distribution of irrigation wells are dry. I am in no mood to
straw to traffickers, breaking the law and Kamlesh said. He had no interest in fol- year high of 11.5% led by higher prices of were 6% higher year-on-year between rains is starkly visible this year: floods in spend money,” added Patidar. He rides a
risking arrest under the stringent Narcotic lowing in his father’s footsteps. vegetables, cereals, pulses and milk; it April and July, but sales of premium bikes Himachal which claimed more than 240 rickety bike purchased way back in 2002.
LIVEMINT.COM MINT MONEY ThurSDay, 28 SepTember 2023
NeW Delhi 11

MINT 20* MUTUAL FUND

SCHEMES TO INVEST IN
How India’s MF ecosystem
20
We have hand-picked 20 mutual funds for your portfolio that have jumped
through hoops of good returns, low risk, good portfolio hygiene and our own
qualitative research. We have restricted the choice universe to 10 categories out
has evolved since the 90s
of the total 37 and given you at least two options to pick from each.

3-years return 5-years return Corpus

EQ UIT Y (%) (%) (₹ cr)
LARGE-CAP
UTI Nifty Index Fund - Growth 22.28 13.14 12,092
Sebi’s interventions, technological advances have revolutionized the mutual fund landscape
HDFC Index Fund - Nifty 50 Plan 22.10 12.91 9,446
Category average 21.80 12.76 Sashind Ningthoukhongjam

EQUITY FLEXICAP
sashind.nj@livemint.com
How MFs are distributed

I
Canara Robeco Flexi Cap 20.74 14.60 10,133 t is one of those days that most Gen Evolution of MF Intermediaries in India: The MF industry has moved steadily towards
Parag Parikh Flexi Cap 24.34 18.83 40,760 X investors still remember vividly. cutting intermediation costs
Category average 23.48 14.23 A tryst with history on 16 May 1992. How MF distributors earned in the 90s? MUTUAL FUND DISTRIBUTORS
A long, serpentine queue had
EQUITY SMALL AND MIDCAP formed in the heart of India’s capi- Entry load Mutual Fund
Axis Midcap 24.04 17.46 22,665 tal New Delhi early that morning. The Exit load distributor count 1,40,000
SBI Small Cap 32.85 21.13 20,912 restless queue, which was waiting for Annual expense Number of
Unit Trust of India (UTI) to open its active MFDs
1,00,000*
Category average Midcap 29.94 18.03 NFO expense* (earlier called IPOs)
Category average Smallcap 36.75 20.70
office, soon went berserk and the police *approx
*then called Initial issue expense
had to be called in. And all this hap-
pened because UTI, the country’s larg- How MF sales evolved? Corporate distributors: Market share
EQUITY (TAXSAVER) National
est fund house then, had launched a 6,600 MFDs distributors
Canara Robeco Equity Tax Saver 22.45 16.12 5,981 2008 2009
close-ended fund, Mastergain 92, and 17
Mirae Asset Tax Saver 24.37 16.50 17,630  Ban on NFO  Removal of
every investor wanted to lay their
Category average 24.40 14.12 hands on it, says Dhirendra Kumar,
commissions entry load = (in %) 49
 Commissions 100,000
CEO of Value Research. employees 34
HY BRID from exit load
The frenzy must have been wit- (EUIN holders) Banks
BALANCED ADVANTAGE stopped
nessed in other parts of the country as
Edelweiss Balanced Advantage 15.20 11.89 9,395 well, says Kumar. According to a news 2013 2012 Source: Why World's Largest AMCs not present in India by
ICICI Prudential Balanced Advantage 15.56 11.37 49,102 report later, ‘Master Gain 92’ debuted  Introduction  B-15 incentive
CA Rajkamal Tiwari, CFO of Union MF

Category average 14.70 10.42 with 6.5 million investors, a record for of direct plans introduced
any equity fund. Kumar says he has CHALLENGES
never seen such euphoria around 2018 2023  Competition from direct plans
ARBITRAGE
mutual funds since. And other industry  B-15 upgraded  B30  Can sell insurance for higher commission
Kotak Equity Arbitrage 4.92 5.21 25,860
veterans concur. The mutual fund (MF) to B-30 incentive  About 28,000 MFDs (having more than ₹5 crore corpus)
Tata Arbitrage 4.63 NA 7,150
industry has since grown in size and  Ban on upfront removed control 83% of the industry
Category average 4.59 4.91
now has assets under management of commissions  Choosing MFDs as a sole career is difficult until it reaches a
₹46 trillion. The B15 and B30 incentives aim to boost MF penetration decent size
Returns since Date of Corpus in cities beyond the top 15 and 30 by offering higher
O UT O F T HE B O X launch launch (₹ cr) Mint spoke to some industry veter- commissions for sales there.  Different commission for different MFDs, depends on scale
BHARAT Bond ETF - April 2031 4.80 23 Jul 2020 12,860 ans to understand how the MF ecosys-
Motilal Oswal S&P 500 Index Fund 15.16 28 Apr 2020 2,878
tem has evolved since the 90s. MF dis- RIA
Absolute returns
tributors were then called Independent IA members
RIA as per Sebi CHALLENGES
Returns as on 25 September 2023; Corpus data as of August 2023; Growth option in regular plans has been used Financial Advisers (IFAs) and could with BASL 75% 10 states  Compliance burden for
*Debt funds can be viewed in the full table online earn heavy commissions in the form of of RIAs stay with zero RIAs practitioners
Data and analysis by CRISIL Research Compiled by Neil Borate annual charges, entry load, exit load in the top 5
1,325 934*  Clients not comfortable
and initial issue expenses. The last was cities *Industry experts say
there aren't more than paying fixed fees
levied during the launch of a new 500 practicing RIAs
fund— an initial public offering as it

Can rent allowance be claimed was known then. Now, it is a new fund
offering. Asset management compa-
nies (AMCs) could charge an initial
India is still in the early stages of a fee-based advisory model
Fee income
Commission income
India

for more than one property?
Amit Bhachawat
I am renting a house in
Mumbai and my parents
live in another rented
property. I am paying the
rent for both houses and
have the agreement and
rent receipts. Can house
rent allowance (HRA) be
claimed for multiple prop-
erties?
-Name withheld on request
HRA exemption is allowed
under section 10(13A) of the
Income Tax Act. Further, Rule
2A of the Act stipulates the con-
ditions to be satisfied to claim
HRA exemption. One of the
conditions given in Rule 2A is:
the allowance must be specifi-
cally granted to the employee
by his employer to meet
expenditure actually incurred
on payment of rent in respect
of residential accommodation
occupied by the assessee.
Accordingly, the HRA
exemption will be available
only in respect of the rented
residential accommodation
occupied by you and therefore
you will be able to claim HRA
benefit only for rent paid in
respect of your residence and
not for the accommodation
rented out for your parents,
even if the rent for that is also
being paid by you.
The amount of HRA that
you can claim is limited to the
lowest of the following: the
ASK MINT
m TA X AT I O N
actual HRA received from
your employer, 50% of your
basic salary (40% if you are liv-
ing in a metro city) and excess
of the actual rent paid over 10%
of your basic salary.
For example, if your basic
salary is ₹50,000 per month
(50% of basic salary: ₹25,000),
and you receive ₹20,000 per
month as HRA and you pay
₹30,000 per month as rent
(₹25,000 over and above the
10% of your salary), then your
HRA exemption will be
₹20,000 as it is the lowest of
the three amounts. For the
financial year, this would work
out to be ₹2.4 lakh
Please note that the HRA
exemption is a deduction from
your taxable income. This
means that the lower your tax-
able income, the lower your
income tax liability will be.
It is important to note that
the income tax department
may scrutinize your HRA
claim if you are claiming it for
multiple properties. There-
fore, it is important to main-
tain proper documentation
and ensure that you are eligi-
ble to claim HRA for both
properties.
You will need to submit the
following documents to your
employer: rent agreements for
both properties, rent receipts
for both properties, declara-
tion form from your employer
stating that you have not
claimed HRA for both proper-
ties simultaneously.
Amit Bhachawat is chief
financial officer of India Mort-
gage Guarantee Corporation
Do you have a personal
finance query? Send in your
queries at
mintmoney@livemint.com
and get them answered by
industry experts.
issue expense of up to 6%. This would
take care of their expenses and the
commissions as well. The entry and exit
load commissions could together be as
high as 7% and distributors got a part of
this as well. To be sure, an entry load is
charged when an investor buys a fund
and an exit load is charged when an
investor sells it.
Gradually, Sebi started working
towards dismantling this commission
structure. The initial issue expense was
removed in 2008. Subsequently, the
entry load was abolished in 2009 and it
could no longer be used for paying dis-
tributor commissions. The exit load
had to be ploughed back to the fund’s
NAV, or net asset value.
In 2012, the market regulator intro-
duced a beyond-15 (B15) incentive to
increase MF penetration. The scheme
paid a higher commission for selling
MFs to investors beyond the top 15 cit-
ies. Around the same time, it levied a
fee for MF transactions: ₹150 for new
investors and ₹100 for existing inves-
tors, for every transaction beyond a
certain threshold.
Then in 2013, Sebi introduced direct
plans whereby investors could buy MF
units directly from AMCs, eliminating
the role of middlemen and commis-
sions. The same year, it permitted reg-
istered investment advisory (RIA). The
RIAs are regulated by Sebi and they are
allowed to charge a fee but barred from
earning commissions on selling regular
mutual fund plans.
MF distributors
They have been around since the
time MFs were introduced in India.
The distributors are individuals or cor-
porations registered with the Associa-
tion of Mutual Funds in India (AMFI)
and can earn a commission on sale of
MFs. As of June 2023, there were 1.4
lakh registered distributors—of these,
6,600 are registered as corporate dis-
Net interest income
Lending income
Other income
APAC
Western Europe
North America
0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%
Source: Boston Consulting Group, 2018
DIRECT MF PENETRATION IN EQUITY Direct Regular
10
17
25 CHALLENGES
 DIY model: No one to guide
2014 2018 2023 in investments
 Apps nudge you to
invest/trade in riskier products
90 83 75
A significant share of direct plans is debt MFs bought by corporate treasuries. Source: Fisdom research, AMFI
tributors and the remaining are indi- consider various factors like risk appe- Fintech apps
viduals. tite and needs of the individual and The launch of direct plans in 2013
A report titled ‘Why World’s Largest family when building an investment sowed the beginnings of new-age fin-
AMCs are not present in India’ in August portfolio. But, a high regulatory burden tech apps. These apps could integrate
said about 22,000 mutual fund distribu- and strict compliance norms have dis- their backend system with registrar
tors, or MFDs, who individually have suaded many from applying for this and transfer agents such as CAMS or
assets of more than ₹5 crore, collectively license from Sebi. There are only about Karvy. Alternatively, they could inte-
control 83% of the industry AUM (regu- 1,300 RIAs in the country. This means grate with exchange-run platforms like
lar plan). Additionally, that the services of an RIA BSE Star MF or NSE MF to offer mutual
110,000 smaller MFDs Investors are still are not accessible for a funds free of any commission in 15 min-
(with less than ₹5 crore not comfortable majority of the population utes, provided investors have the
corpus) earn a very low with fee-based unless they have a huge required documents.
annual trial commission, advisory; RIAs say corpus. Also, of the 1,300 Investors can go directly to an AMC’s
ranging from ₹1 lakh to ₹5 RIAs, 75% are registered in website or transact from RTA-run plat-
compliance
lakh. This shows that the the top 5 cities, with 10 forms. Yet, it was the sleek and user-
distribution business is norms are very states not having even a friendly system of fintech apps
heavily concentrated in the restrictive single RIA. attracted a lot of investors. The only
hands of the top players. Amit Trivedi, problem here was that fintech Apps
Investment advisers co-founder of Osat Knowl- earn nothing from offering direct
MFDs, warn market experts, would edge, said RIAs are broadly of two plans. So, they aim to get customers
want to churn your portfolio at regular kinds: financial planners and outright hooked to their platforms and then
intervals or cross-sell certain funds to derivatives/stock tippers. He said that pitch other financial products that
earn more commission. If investors dis- while the former aligns with Sebi’s bring in revenue. Many experts caution
like this, they can opt for fixed-fee advi- objective of providing advice, the rise that MF apps could sell products that
sory provided by RIAs, who advise cli- in the number of derivative tippers in may not necessarily be suitable for
ents on their personal investments. the form of RIAs led to Sebi introducing retail investors.
A fixed fee reduces the incentive to cumbersome regulations for the RIA (For an extended version of this story,
sell high commission products. RIAs community as a whole. go to livemint.com)

PLANNING FOR FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE AND THE RISK OF FORCED RETIREMENT

POWER
POINT
DEV ASHISH
We welcome your views and comments at
mintmoney@livemint.com
T
he social media often glamourizes the idea of early retire-
ment a little too much. The idea is undoubtedly attractive
and the desire to retire early from the job market may be
widespread. But neither does everyone want to retire early nor
is it suitable for everyone.
People often mistake financial independence for early retire-
ment. While both are part of the FIRE (financial independence,
retire early) concept, they are not the same. Once you have
‘enough’ money to be financially independent, retiring early is an
option that you can consider. But it’s not necessary to opt for it.
So, if you don’t want to retire early, then that is perfectly fine.
But given the new realities of the employment world, what would
you do if you are forced to retire early?
Imagine that you are 52 years old and plan to work till the age
of 60-62 . All of a sudden, you are let go by your employer (the
reasons can vary: due to the availability of younger, lower-paid
employees, lack of updated skills, technological or industry dis-
ruption, etc.). Given your age and experience, it then becomes
extremely difficult to find a suitable job.
This is a real risk. Even if you don’t aim for early retirement,
you could be forced into one. And this is a good enough reason
why people should plan and prepare for early retirement even if
they don’t want to.
And the possibility of being kicked out of the job at not so
young an age and finding it tough to find the next job is not the
only scenario. There are other such possibilities as well.
You are healthy now. But things can change. If your health
issues make it difficult for you to continue working in future, then
you may have to plan for an early retirement. I know a few indi-
viduals in their early 50s who had to quit their jobs due to health
issues. They always wanted to work till their 60s. As is always the
case, your health decides how your life pans out eventually.
Another possibility, though not as dire as the pervious one, is
that you may one day get fed up with the job or work profile that
you currently love. If you have the flexibility of ‘enough-money’
do your retirement planning, assuming that your retirement
(forced or regular) will happen around the age of 50-55. That, of
course, will mean you need to save and invest more. But that is
fine. If it is feasible for you to do that, given your current finances,
at least you will have the flexibility and buffer if, god forbid, the
forced retirement scenario plays out in future.
I have often heard people say that
People should early retirement is a privilege reserved
plan and only for the rich. But whatever your
view might be, do understand why you
prepare for may not end up working till 60 even if
early retirement you want to. If you see merit in this
even if they idea, then prepare for some degree of
don’t want to early retirement, even if you don’t plan
to retire early. Nobody wants to be
forced into anything, let alone retire-
ment.
at that point of time, you can choose to not work instead of being Remember, just like in the game of Monopoly, being forced
forced to so because you do not have any money. into early retirement is like getting a ‘Go directly to retirement’
So, what should you do if you don’t want to retire early? card – no passing ‘Go’, no collecting $200, just a lot of free time
Let’s say you are 35-40 years old and do not subscribe to the and less money than you planned for.
voluntary-early-retirement school of thought. And you plan to Dev Ashish is a registered investment adviser and founder of Sta-
work till 60 or even later. In such a case, it might be a wise idea to ble Investor.
12 ThurSDay, 28 SepTember 2023
New Delhi
OUR VIEW
Let us not resurrect the
ghost of retro taxation
The Centre’s argument of its GST law tweak this year being clarificatory in nature may not
suffice to defend what looks like retrospective taxation. We must not revive that inequity
I
n July, the Goods and Services Tax Council
settled an argument over the GST slab
applicable to online casinos and gaming
platforms and on what sum this tax should
be levied. A rate of 28% on the full sums
staked by customers was a blow to the
business model of these firms, which wanted
only their own fees charged, but it was plainly a
pragmatic call. The activity does have the air of
a luxury, regardless of skill versus luck distinc-
tions, and business inflows are easy to track for
tax assessment. A legislative change was made
in August to formalize that decision, following
which India’s biggest platforms offering those
services have been slapped with tax demands
hugely out of proportion to their recorded
revenues. The notices that some companies
received have eye-popping sums. By one esti-
mate, the industry will eventually be asked to
cough up a total of about ₹1.5 trillion, including
penalties for late payment. Where tax bills
exceed what the very enterprises are worth,
these businesses stare at closure. It is hardly a
surprise that legal challenges are being
mounted to keep these bills at bay.
The GST demands are so large because they
pertain to past liabilities allegedly left unpaid.
But if it turns out to be a case of retrospective
taxation, then the plaintiffs would have a valid
grouse. The earlier dispute was principally
over what counts as such a company’s revenue,
on which GST must be paid. Bet-taking firms
argued this had to be what they kept for their
services rendered, a small fraction of the
money wagered (and pooled for distribution),
while the taxman saw their entire mop-up as
the relevant top-line, deeming all of it taxable
even if most of it was held in escrow accounts
for prize allotments. The tax notices sent
China’s economic slump holds lessons on development
RAHUL JACOB
T
his week, Nomura International’s
head of investment banking for China,
Charles Wang, was reported to have
been told he cannot leave mainland China.
Like many international bankers, Wang is
ordinarily based in Hong Kong, which has an
autonomous judiciary and immigration
apparatus under the terms of the former
is a Mint columnist and a
British colony’s transfer to China in 1997.
Wang’s travel ban is understood to be
former Financial Times foreign
correspondent.
related to an investigation into the affairs of
Bao Fan, China’s top tech dealmaker, who
has not been seen in public since February.
Also, this month, Li Shangfu, China’s
defence minister, disappeared. The govern-
ment has made no comment on his where-
abouts. But as with the disappearance of the
country’s then foreign minister Qin Gang in
June, Beijing says nothing about even high-
profile sackings. In Qin’s case, his name was
removed from relevant government web-
sites, a 21st century equivalent of being
declared a non-person, but then put back as
a former foreign minister.
VIEWS
ISTOCKPHOTO
Subjects taught in school are set
to emphasize rounded learning
The new national curriculum framework aims to break silos and foster synergy across disciplines
ANURAG BEHAR
is CEO of Azim Premji Foundation.
S
chool education is organized
around the study of subjects. We
don’t pay much attention to sub-
jects until students reach the 11th grade
and are forced to choose which ones to
study. The grouping of subjects and
requirements by boards, capacity of
schools to offer different subjects,
societal aspirations, higher education
entrance requirements and competitive
demand among students all influence
these choices. Students are often slotted
or ‘hard streamed’ into a particular dis-
cipline, such as Science, Arts or Com-
merce. Each stream is tightly defined,
assume that the latter was always the case, so cutting off students from other subjects
errant taxpayers are liable for their erroneous and fields. Such silo-ing have long been
a weakness of our education, though
underpayments of the past. As the authorities not much public attention has been
argue, all that was done this summer was a given to this matter. That it’s a weakness
clarification made of an extant rule. Yet, since is now obvious and is often expressed as
it involved an amendment of our GST law by the need for ‘multidisciplinary educa-
Parliament, harshly assessed gaming firms tion.’ Even the job market demands
exposure and understanding of a wide
could contend that it was a rule change that range of subjects and fields. The
multiplied their burden, and that GST levied National Curriculum Framework 2023
on more than just the platform fees must apply (NCF) addresses this matter squarely.
only with prospective effect for it to be fair. What subjects to study? This ques-
Betting platforms may have interpreted tion is not merely important in Grades
11-12, but is critical from the very start of
what’s taxable to suit their game. As they are schooling, the first 13 years from pre-
not specially licensed custodians of public school to Grade 10. This column and the
money—say, like banks—their failure to treat next few will explore the approach the
all inflows as revenues in their books was pre- NCF takes to school subjects.
sumptuous, no doubt. This sector’s regulatory In the Foundational Stage of ages 3 to
8 (i.e., from pre-school to Grade 2), edu-
framework has only just begun falling in place,
and it is unclear why its players expected tax-
free access to public funds. Their attempt to
escape the tag of ‘gambling’ and assume moral
superiority by talking of gaming skills was also
pointless, given that their services are far from
essential. Still, they would have a case if the www.livemint.com
burden they’re being asked to bear is found
contingent on this year’s legislative move. This
means a grey zone will likely be encountered SENSEX 20,263.71 ®
CURRENCY OUTFLOWS
Govt may bring
on what the original rule was, which in turn back royalty
payment caps
casts our law-making processes in poor light.
Government looking to
reimpose limits that
were removed in 2009;
experts say move will
The government will need to exercise caution
be seen as regressive
B Y R EMYA N AIR & year ended March 2008, where-
A MAN M ALIK
·························
NEW DELHI
I ndia may again cap royalty
payments that local firms
in the arguments it makes. Among its business
make to their overseas par-
ents to restrict the outflow of
foreign currency, a move that
experts say will be seen as re-
gressive.
Companies could earlier only
remit royalty involving foreign
technology transfer up to 5% on
domestic sales and 8% on ex-
friendly stances was a public rejection of taxes
ports, and up to 1% for domestic
sales and 2% for exports when
no technology transfer was in-
volved, such as on account of
brand value. They required the
approval of the department of
industrial policy and promotion
if the payments exceeded these
limits.
applied in retrospect. The Vodafone spectre of
The department now wants to
reimpose these same limits that
were withdrawn in December
2009, according to two officials
familiar with the matter. They
spoke on condition of anonymi-
ty.
“The minister is appraised of
the matter, the file is with him,”
a decade ago took a long time for India to shake
an official of the department
said. “Only once he gives the go
ahead, the cabinet note can be
prepared.”
Some domestic companies
sharply increased royalty pay-
ments to their parent firms after
the government relaxed the
rules, according to a December
off. Willy-nilly, the country’s tax authorities
NOTE TO READERS
The Media Marketing Initiative on
Page 17 is the equivalent of a paid­
for advertisement, and no Mint
journalists were involved in
creating it. Readers would do well
to treat is as an advertisement.
came to be seen as placing revenue greed over
principle. This is not a reputation we should
risk the return of. The ghost of retro taxes must
Mint is also available for R7 with
Hindustan Times in Delhi-NCR only
not get a chance to haunt our economy again.
MY VIEW | WOrld APArT
Only Shakespeare’s tales of regicide and gress, when Beijing observed that “houses
perhaps Agatha Christie novels have plot were for living in, not speculation,” which
twists that resemble what came next. On came to be seen as a rallying cry of Xi’s new
Tuesday, the Financial Times lifted the veil economic policy. A plethora of regulations
on what might have been the reason for the followed, governing such aspects as higher
disappearance of Qin, once a protégé of down payments for mortgages for second
President Xi Jinping. It alleged Qin had had homes. Xi has wisely argued repeatedly that
an affair with a well-known TV presenter of he wants a more equitable
a show on world affairs. The newspaper cited distribution of wealth in
conversations with six people close to the China, but attacking both
foreign policy establishment and Fu Xiao- the dynamic tech sector
tian, the TV host. When Qin was appointed and property market in
foreign minister, he appears to have reduced succession has slammed
contact with Fu, prompting her to leave a the brakes on the economy
drip-feed of not-so-subtle hints about their
relationship on social media. “When Qin was
and damaged confidence.
By one estimate, China
appointed state councillor (in March), she
posted a picture of the baby raising his hand,
has excess stock to cover
housing demand for the
adding a caption, “A victorious conclusion,” next seven years. Even this
the FT reported. may be an underestimate,
This mostly behind-the-scenes drama is as many in its middle class
playing out against the slowing of China’s own two properties or
economy. It grew by a seasonally adjusted more. Most have no expe-
0.8% in the second quarter, down from the rience of a deflating property bubble. After
previous quarter’s 2.2% growth. Property decades of overbuilding and overinvesting
and construction have slowed dramatically in property, it is hard to estimate what the
this year and the economy still bears the real level of demand is. UBS estimates that
scarring effects of unusually harsh lock- property sales and construction could settle
downs during the pandemic. It will be six at 50-60% of its pre-pandemic peak. Con-
years next month since the 19th party Con- struction has long contributed a dispropor-
New Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Kolkata, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Chandigarh*, Pune*
CONTENT PARTNER
NIFTY 6,012.10 ®
2012 report by Institutional In-
vestor Advisory Services India
Ltd, a proxy advisory firm.
A study of 20 such companies
showed that royalty payments
to foreign parents tripled to
`3,601 crore in 2011-12 com-
pared with `1,196 crore in the
as sales grew by only 70% in the
same period.
The government, in the na-
tional budget for financial year
2013-14, raised the tax on royal-
ties that domestic companies
pay to their parents abroad to
25% from 10%. But the higher
tax rate applies only in cases
where the foreign parent is
based in a country with which
India does not have a double
taxation avoidance treaty.
If the government does con-
sider such a step, it will be a ret-
rograde one, said J.N. Gupta, a
former executive director with
capital markets regulator Secu-
rities and Exchange Board of In-
dia.
“Such moves make investors
jittery and are knee-jerk reac-
tions,” Gupta said, adding that it
makes more sense to tax a pre-
mium on brand value creation
rather than new technology
coming into the country.
Companies such as Hindus-
tan Unilever Ltd and Switzer-
land-based Holcim Ltd’s Indian
units, ACC Ltd and Ambuja Ce-
ments Ltd have increased royal-
ty fees to their parents in the
past few months.
In December, Hindustan Uni-
lever said it will increase royalty
payments to its parent, UK-
based Unilever Plc., the world’s
second-biggest consumer-
goods company, from about
1.4% of net sales to 1.9% in the
year to March, and then steadily
raise this to 3.15% in fiscal year
2018.
ACC and Ambuja Cements
agreed to hike royalty payments
to Holcim to 1% of net annual
sales from January from around
0.6% earlier. Shareholders of
both firms have opposed the
plans.
“The fact that the government
is considering such a move indi-
cates that it is looking to bring
in some capital controls given
the adverse movement in the
currency market,” said Sunil
Jain, a tax partner at law firm J.
Sagar associates. “It will have a
destabilizing effect. We have
only recently started giving pos-
itive signals to foreign investors
and emerging from the effects of
retrospective amendments to
tax laws. This will look like a re-
gressive step.”
The rupee has lost more than
14% this year against the dollar
after touching a record low of
68.85 on 28 August. The coun-
try’s current account deficit
TURN TO PAGE 2®
Its rise was
misunderstood
and Beijing’s
response to its
current woes
also reveals a
misdiagnosis
LIVEMINT.COM
MY VIEW | OThEr SPhErE
cation is to be ‘play-based’. This doesn’t subjects like art or vocational education
mean unorganized, but organized in a are taught and not glossed over. This
manner that is like play for the child. space is created by reduction of content
This is because at this age, children in other subjects such as social science
learn best through play. Such play can and science. Content reduction also
be organized by stories, games, music, enables deeper learning of those very
physical activities and many other subjects—with genuine understanding
mechanisms that together help the and development of crucial capacities
holistic development of the child, such as critical thinking—instead of rote
including literacy and numeracy. It is in memorization of facts, which is the
Grades 1 and 2 that study gets formal- inevitable outcome of heavy content.
ized into the subjects of language and Second, it establishes all subjects as
mathematics, but because of the play- equally important. It does this by giving
based teaching approach, connects adequate time to all subjects and having
children to a wide range of matters, formalized assessments for all.
including social life and the physical Third, it devises an approach through
environment, art and music, sports and which these subjects can be taught
working with hands. Learning happens within constraints, including current
in all these areas. From Grade 3 school resources. For example, most
onwards, study is fully organized
around subjects, while the pedagogical
approach is chosen appropriately for
each age group.
schools in India do not have a vocational
education teacher. So, it devises a cur-
ricular approach that includes learning
standards and content selection that
In Grades 3-5, the Preparatory Stage, can be handled by existing teachers
three subjects are added to the list from with relevant training and the help of
the Foundational Stage: art including local community resources. Addressing
music, physical education and well-be- these issues in the very design of the
ing and ‘the-world-around-us,’ an inter- curriculum improves the likelihood of
disciplinary study of the child’s social high-fidelity NCF implementation.
and physical environment. The effective teaching and learning
In Grades 6-8, or the Middle Stage, of all these subjects in an integrated
‘the-world-around-us’ doesn’t continue manner is necessary to develop the full
as a subject and four subjects of study range of knowledge, capacities, values
are added: a third language, social sci- and dispositions our children need; the
ence, science and vocational education. NCF focuses on this objective. It also
In Grades 9-10, the first phase of the establishes ‘learning standards,’ the
Secondary Stage, one interdisciplinary progressively specific goals of learning
subject is added: ‘Individual in Society’ for each subject. These standards are
in Grade 9, which is about ethical and designed in a way that knits subjects
moral reasoning; and ‘Environmental together by cross pollinating learning
Education’ in Grade 10. goals across subjects. For example, a
In Grades 11-12, the second phase of learning goal in social science will
the Secondary Stage, students must require the use of art. This breaks silos
choose subjects with a new method, and fosters synergy across subjects.
enabling multidisciplinary exposure Ensuring that our education system
and avoiding narrow streaming. promotes the study of the full range
The NCF tackles three critical sets of human knowledge and capacities—and
issues, which will otherwise make the connects rather than divides how these
implementation of this overall subject subjects come together and reinforce
scheme difficult to implement. one another—will help prepare our
First, it creates adequate ‘time-table children better for an uncertain and
space’ for all the subjects. It ensures that constantly evolving future.
Monday, September 23, 2013 Vol.7 No.227 `3.00 in Delhi­NCR/`4.00 outside Delhi­NCR 24 PAGES
CAPITAL CALCULUS: Is Kejriwal
India’s Beppe Grillo? >4
BANKER’S TRUST: Wanted: An independent,
accountable RBI >6
CORPORATE: Varun Berry charts his strategy
for Britannia >8
VIEWS: Avinash Persaud on why the world
needs a Brics fund >23
DOLLAR `62.28 ® EURO `84.15 ® GOLD `30,000 ® OIL $109.22 ®
If you skilfully follow the
KAI PFAFFENBACH/ REUTERS
Sebi set QUICK EDIT
to shelve Market
safety net addiction
plan for IPOs T he US Federal Reserve
has a $3.7 trillion
multidisciplinary path, you
balance sheet that is
currently growing at the
B Y A NIRUDH L ASKAR rate of $85 billion a month,
anirudh.l@livemint.com thanks to its bond
························· purchases. It will expand to
MUMBAI $4.7 trillion over the next
I ndia’s capital market regula-
tor is likely to let go of a pro-
posal to introduce a safety net
12 months at the current
pace. All that Ben
Bernanke has been
for retail investors participat- threatening to do is to slow
ing in initial public offerings down this rate of
will never wish to come
(IPOs). expansion, perhaps by a
The primary market advisory modest $10 billion a month
committee of the Securities at first. So the Fed could
and Exchange Board of India still end up with a balance
(Sebi) deliberated on the sug- sheet of around $4.6
gestion for almost a year and trillion this time next year.
decided not to go ahead with it This is not monetary
in the face of stiff resistance by
investment bankers and be-
contraction by any stretch
of imagination; it is merely
cause of the insipid state of af- a modestly slower rate of
fairs in the market. The com- monetary expansion. The
back. It would be like cutting
mittee examines capital mar- very fact that even talk
ket policies related to issuance about a taper can rattle
of new securities by compa- markets or that an
nies. unexpected postponement
The regulator instead plans of the inevitable can lead
to adopt a different approach to a huge relief rally across
to cushion retail investors in the world shows the
the event of a sudden erosion dangerous extent to which
in the share prices of firms the financial system is now
soon after they list on the addicted to cheap money.
Poll triumph: German Chancellor Angela Merkel won an overwhelming bourses. This will be done by It is time investors realized
off your hands.
endorsement for a third term even as her Free Democratic ally plunged offering a heavy discount on that the Fed balance sheet
out of parliament, probably forcing her to seek a new governing partner, IPO offer prices compared with cannot keep growing
television projections showed. Merkel’s Christian Democratic bloc took the average trading price of indefinitely. That is the
42.3% of Sunday’s vote to 26.3% for the main opposition, according to stark reality.
projections on ZDF television. See Page 24 TURN TO PAGE 2®
The road
not taken
for the
Oscars
B Y N ANDINI R AMNATH
nandini.r@livemint.com
C HA R L I E MU N G E R
·························
MUMBAI
I n any other year, the deci-
sion of the Film Federation
of India to select The Good
Road as the country’s submis-
sion for the foreign language
film Oscar would have been
hailed as mature, tasteful and
in step with the current lan-
guage of cinema around the
world.
Unfortunately for the federa-
tion, this year happens to be
one in which there were at
least three well-crafted and in-
ternational-minded films in
the running—Ship of Theseus,
The Good Road, and the fa-
vourite, The Lunchbox. Until
the federation announced its
decision on 21 September, few
people had heard of The Good
Road, let alone seen it (the
movie had a limited release for
a week in Gujarat in July). The
twin morals of this story: don’t
trust press statements and
Twitter declarations, and don’t
underestimate the federation’s
ability to spring surprises.
TURN TO PAGE 3®
tionate share of GDP growth in China. trast, ‘Made in China,’ announced in 2015,
For the past two decades, economists have led the world in industrial subsidies and
said that households and state-owned cor- favours reducing dependence on foreign
porations save too much. Household con- technology and promoting China’s own.
sumption is only 40% of China’s GDP. By Huawei’s breakthrough in making an
comparison, private consumption is 68% of advanced chip for its Mate 60 Pro phone
GDP in the US and almost 60% of nominal shows significant success, but, as with all
GDP in India. Beijing could industrial policy, the overall ledger is likely
increase social security to show the economy and Beijing net losers
benefits such as unemploy- as a result of these subsidies.
ment payouts and health China’s spectacular rise as an economy
insurance and use an eco- has arguably been misunderstood for years.
nomic stimulus. A country A seemingly omniscient autocracy has been
with among the best high- a handicap for the country, even if it speeds
ways, high-speed rail links
and airports in the world
up policy decisions and glitzy urban pro-
jects. Its high growth years since the 1980s
does not need more infra-
structure investment.
were the result of a transfer of know-how
and entrepreneurial energy from Taiwan
Instead, in the last dec- and Hong Kong, which benefitted from a
ade, welfare payments have well-educated workforce in China. A prop-
been restricted to the very erty and construction boom helped, but
old or severely disabled and boosting private consumption is still not on
in any case range from less Beijing’s agenda. With the economy slow-
than ₹6,000 per month in cities to half that ing, while the rest of the world’s G20 leaders
in villages. The problem, as The New York were in New Delhi early this month, Presi-
Times observed in an article last month, is dent Xi travelled instead to an old industrial
that Xi told a Communist Party meeting in belt in northeastern China. He reiterated his
2021 that China “must not go overboard with message that robots need to be used in car
social security, and steer clear of the idle- factories and that China needs more state-
ness-breeding trap of welfarism.” By con- led investment to upgrade manufacturing.
LIVEMINT.COM VIEWS ThUrSDAy, 28 SepTember 2023
New DeLhI 13

thEIr VIEW M I N T C U R AT O R

What does a drop in household It’s Lina Khan versus Amazon

in the US antitrust spotlight
financial savings imply for India? Expect an FTC led by her to take a digital-age look at monopolies

Though household debt has risen, the overall savings rate hasn’t suddenly fallen. But it must rise for faster economic growth

ISTOCKPHOTO

ANNA EDGERTON &

LEAH NYLEN
are, respectively, Bloomberg journalists
covering tech and national security,
SUDIPTO MUNDLE and antitrust.
is chairman, Centre for Development Studies.

T L
he household financial savings data
recently published in the latest issue of
the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) bulle-
tin created quite a stir. It indicated that
India’s net household financial savings
rate had declined to only 5.1% of GDP
in 2022-23, the lowest in decades. Some analysts
interpreted this as a symptom of rising indebted-
ness among households. Others interpreted the
data as a worrying indication of a declining savings
rate, noting that India’s high growth in the first
decade of this century had been enabled by a high
savings rate in that period. To calm market senti-
ments, the finance ministry found it necessary to
issue a clarification that the decline in our financial
savings rate is not a symptom of any distress in
the household sector, but merely a reflection of
changing household preferences in the composi-
tion of their asset portfolio.
To understand what is really going on, it is nec-
essary to look closely at the data. As shown in the
table, there was a decline of over 2 percentage
points of GDP in net household financial savings
(net financial assets) to 5.1% in 2022-23 on top of a
4.3 percentage point decline from the pandemic
year peak of 11.5% in 2020-21 to 7.2% in 2021-22.
This is not just a symptom of post-covid volatility,
because the net financial savings rate in 2022-23 is
also 3 percentage points lower than the 8.1% of
GDP recorded in 2019-20, the last pre-pandemic
normal year. This decline in the rate of net finan-
cial savings is almost entirely attributable to a rise
of approximately 2 percentage points of GDP in
financial liabilities in 2022-23 compared to
2021-22 as well as 2019-20. We then need to look
at the composition of financial liabilities of house-
holds and see how that has changed.
Banks loans are by far the largest component,
accounting for over 75% of household borrowing.
Borrowing from non-bank finance companies
(NBFCs) are a distant second, followed by housing
finance and insurance. Between 2020-21 and
2022-23, there was a large decline in the share of
household borrowing from banks, declining from
over 86% in 2021-22 to about 77% in 2022-23. The
share of housing finance also declined. However,
there was a sharp increase in the share of
borrowing from NBFCs, which rose from 2.4% in
2021-22 to 15.2% in 2022-23, a more than six-fold
increase in a single year (see table; its component
percentages may not add up to 100 because of
rounding off and excluded minor components).
So the decline in net household financial savings
is primarily a reflection of the increase in financial
liabilities of the household sector. This, in turn, is a
reflection of the shift in household borrowing from
banks (and housing finance to a less extent) to
NBFCs. We also know that growth of bank credit
has been high, but much of the enhanced credit
flow has gone to NBFCs, real estate and personal
loans, not industry. The non-performing asset
ratios of commercial banks in both the
ina Khan drew attention as a law stu-
dent in 2017 with an article arguing for
a broad re-imagining of US antitrust
law. The company she focused on was FTC chair Lina Khan shot to fame as a law
Amazon.com. Now Khan is chair of the US student with an antitrust paper REUTERS
Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which
has sanctioned Amazon for privacy lapses What other cases does the FTC have
and is suing it for allegedly exploiting its against Amazon? The others are consumer
market power by overcharging merchants protection cases. In May, Amazon paid $25
and steering consumers to its own prod- million to settle the agency’s complaint
ucts. Since much of US antitrust law is over that Amazon’s Alexa-powered speakers
a century old, written for a different econ- illegally collected information about chil-
omy, this case against Amazon will test dren under the age of 13 without parental
whether Khan’s interpretation holds up. consent. The company also paid $5.8 mil-
What business practices is the FTC inves- lion to settle a case alleging that it didn’t
tigating? In a lawsuit, the FTC and 17 states take steps to protect the privacy of users of
accused Amazon of engaging in illegal con- its Ring video doorbell. One month later,
duct to stifle competition. The suit says it the FTC again sued Amazon in a consumer
forces sellers on its platform to use its logis- protection case, alleging the company
tics and delivery services in exchange for duped consumers into signing up for its
prominent placement and punishes mer- Prime service membership and deliber-
chants that offer lower prices on rival sites. ately made it hard to cancel. Amazon
The probe began in 2019. denies these allegations, and that suit is still
What does Amazon say? Amazon says unresolved. The FTC is separately investi-
heavily from banks as intermediaries, and on-lent that the practices outlined in the FTC’s gating Amazon’s proposed $1.65 billion
Household story large sums to the household sector. complaint actually benefit customers and acquisition of iRobot, which make the
Net financial assets declined mostly on Thus, banks have cleaned up their balance the online retail market and that the FTC’s Roomba automated vacuum cleaner, but
account of greater debt but overall savings sheets and shifted risk to NBFCs, but the risk case is “wrong on the facts and the law.” the agency has not filed a complaint in that
have thankfully held up. exposure of the financial sector as a whole is no Amazon earlier said that retail is a competi- particular case.
less. Indeed, it is higher, since the indebtedness of tive market and it competes with others What other businesses does Amazon have?
Composition of financial assets (% GDP)
the household sector has gone up. both online and off. The company says it In addition to the e-commerce site, fulfill-
2019-20 2020-21 2021-22 2022-23
Unfortunately, undertaking a robust assessment seeks to offer customers the best shopping ment services, Prime video and music
Net financial assets 8.1 11.5 7.2 5.1 of the financial health of India’s household sector is experience, including the lowest prices, streaming, Amazon is also one of the
Gross financial assets 12.0 15.4 11.1 10.9 very challenging because the available data lumps and displays a range of tags. world’s biggest providers of cloud comput-
Financial Liabilities 3.9 3.9 3.8 5.8 together two completely different groups of eco- Who are the third-party sellers on Ama- ing via Amazon Web Services. Amazon also
nomic agents. On one side, you have business zon’s marketplace? In addition to selling bought Whole Foods, making it a player in
Composition of financial liabilities (% share)
households which own and run various micro, products directly, Amazon also acts as a the grocery business.
2019-20 2020-21 2021-22 2022-23
small and medium enterprises that can broadly be kind of consignment store, offering third- What’s the significance of this case for
Total household borrowing 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 clubbed together as the ‘unorganized sector.’ On party sellers a way to reach Amazon cus- antitrust law and for Lina Khan? President
Borrowings from banks 65.8 81.9 86.1 76.9 the other side, there are the non-business house- tomers. This business mix makes Amazon Joe Biden’s decision to appoint Khan to
Borrowing from NBFCs 32.4 11.1 2.4 15.2 holds. The two groups are subject to very different a competitor as well as a business partner, head the FTC was celebrated by antitrust
Housing finance lenders 0.8 6.6 10.9 7.4 types of constraints, risks, opportunities and and some independent merchants have advocates who want the US to return to the
Insurance 1.0 0.4 0.5 0.6 incentives. Thus, any assessment of the financial alleged that Amazon uses its gatekeeper trust-busting of the early 20th century.
health of the household sector without data dis- role to disadvantage competing merchants This new school of legal thinking, beyond
Savings rates (% GDP)
aggregated at least for these two broad groups is and even use its proprietary consumer data merely decrying industry consolidation,
2019-20 2020-21 2021-22 unavoidably speculative. to manufacture competing products. has raised specific complaints about the
Household savings 19.1 22.4 19.7 That said, the decline in India’s net household What is Amazon’s market share in the US? power that a handful of US companies has
Domestic savings 29.6 28.8 30.2 financial savings rate—even compared to 2019-20, That depends on how you define the mar- held over the broader tech industry.
the last pre-pandemic normal year—doesn’t reflect ket, which will be an important question In addition to her famous law school
Sources: Reserve Bank of India Bulletin; Ministry of Statistics &
Programme Implementation; Author computations` a sudden decline in either the household savings for the FTC’s antitrust lawyers to answer in article on modern monopolies, Lina Khan
rate or domestic savings rate. At 19.7% and 30.2% their complaint. The FTC is expected to worked on a House subcommittee investi-
SATISH KUMAR/MINT
of GDP respectively, both were a bit higher in argue that Amazon’s marketplace is the gating the issue, culminating in a report
private and public sector have also improved a 2021-22 than in 2019-20. A savings rate of 30.2% is most used website for buying a range of released in 2020 that helped inform a
great deal. Bringing together these pieces of the also higher than in most emerging market and products and that it illegally ties access to series of tech-focused antitrust bills that
puzzle, it would appear that there has been high developing economies. But it is lower than the its marketplace with use of its logistics ser- got traction in both chambers of US Con-
growth in demand for loans from households. rates achieved in most years of the past two dec- vice, which raises prices for consumers. gress but failed to become law.
However, banks have adhered to stringent lending ades, especially compared to several during the Amazon accounts for 37.6% of all online Given this history, Amazon has called on
norms, leaving many unsatisfied borrowers in the first decade of this century, when the savings rate retail sales in the US, but only 3.5% of total Khan to recuse herself from the FTC’s
household sector who have not qualified for bank had risen to 35-36%. Sustaining economic growth US retail including online and offline busi- investigation of the company, but two
loans. These less creditworthy borrowers have rates of 7-8% would not be possible unless the nesses, according to Insider Intelligence. judges have ruled that there are no prob-
turned to NBFCs, whose lending norms are less economy gets back to those high savings rates. Amazon is six times bigger than its nearest lems with Khan’s participation in cases filed
stringent. The NBFCs themselves have borrowed These are the author’s personal views. online competitor, Walmart.com. in a federal court. ©BLOOMBERG

thEIr VIEW

To tip or not to tip and the dilemma of a service charge

ping norms differ worldwide from around
VIDYA MAHAMBARE 5% to 25%.
How does a service charge that some eat-
eries add by default to our bill differ from the
traditional form of tipping? We are free to
pay a tip in cash to a server, but a service
what they would if tips were paid directly.
Third, it lets firms keep workers’ wages to
a bare minimum while luring them into jobs
by guaranteeing additional cash. As wages
do not have to be increased, a service charge
also helps firms keep product prices lower.
customers while presenting the bill that this
charge is optional. However, many do not
follow this practice. Some people pay service
charges, and, at times, an additional tip.
The Delhi high court fined a restaurant
organization for non-compliance of its ear-
Swiggy experimented with prompting
customers to pay tips after the delivery,
when feedback is collected. Since then,
however, they have reverted to the original
model of asking for a tip when placing the
order, perhaps because not enough people

A
tip, an age-old appreciation of good charge generates revenue, which the man- This way, firms avoid an adverse impact on lier directives. It directed restaurants to are inclined to return to the app or website
service, is no longer a simple matter. agement has control over. Managers can demand and profits, while replace the term “service to provide feedback each time.
A recent directive issued to restau- decide how to distribute the intake among retaining workers. charge” with “staff contri- What should customers do? Sometimes
rants by the Delhi high court in India’s con- employees. In contrast, in case of a tip, a People order food based Customers bution” and specify on being traditional makes sense: Just pay a tip
troversy over service charges has brought firm’s management has no right to ask either on prices listed on menu their menus in bold that (and generous one) directly to those you
the issue back into the limelight. party, the worker or customer. cards. When the bill should ideally tips need not be given after wish to show appreciation towards. It
What exactly is the matter? We routinely Typically, service charge collections are arrives, people typically go a staff contribution is paid. encourages good service and reaches its
pay an add-on over listed price for several distributed among customer-facing by the default or status quo
be aware of It remains to be seen if res- intended beneficiaries, whether restaurant

is professor of economics at
services, voluntarily or prompted. It can be
a service charge included in some restaurant
Great Lakes Institute of
Management, Chennai.
bills or an online cue to “add a tip” for a food
delivery agent or cab driver. Alternatively, as
per a long-standing tradition, some firms
leave it to customers to tip workers directly.
Why do firms adopt different practices
when the basic idea is the same: customers
should acknowledge good service which
also allows low-skilled workers make extra
money over and above their low wages?
If people use a service repeatedly from the
same firm, say a hairdresser, a tip is also seen
as ensuring continued service quality.
Sometimes, we pay a tip out of social norms
or guilt, even if the service is not good. Tip-
employees like servers as well as backroom
workers such as cleaners and cooks. When
we pay a tip, it goes only to the person who
serves us. While service charges may benefit
more workers, there is a catch.
First, no one really knows how much of
the service charge pooled from customers is
passed on to the staff. In recent years, there
have been reports of restaurant owners not
passing on the entire amount. In response,
the income tax department had clarified that
firms are liable to pay income tax on service
charge collections not distributed to work-
ers. Second, because service charge collec-
tion is divided among several workers, the
intended beneficiaries of a tip make less than
bias: If it needs a blank
filled for “service charge,”
the dynamics
they miss doing so, and if it
slaps on a service charge,
at play and also
they pay up. Many of us exercise truly
display a cognitive tend-
ency to prefer the existing mindful choices
state of affairs rather than
make an active choice.
Some people may not want to come across as
rude, especially in a social setting. So printed
service charges end up taking the form of
automated tipping.
To make it easier for customers to decide
whether and how much to pay as a service
charge, restaurants ought to inform their
taurants comply with this
directive.
How do taxi service or
food delivery firms manage
customers’ tipping behav-
iour? The experience of
Swiggy shows that during
the pandemic, a higher
proportion of customers
were happy to pay a tip, in addition to the
delivery charge, when placing orders.
Empathy for delivery personnel drove cus-
tomer behaviour during covid. This propor-
tion fell post-pandemic, once customers
reverted to their basic trait of wanting a sat-
isfactory experience before paying a tip.
servers, delivery personnel, hairdressers,
cab drivers or housekeeping staff.
Should customer worry about the service
charge or staff contribution? Pay if you are
price insensitive and are not worried about
how much of it is passed on to workers. Else,
ask the staff if they get a share, then decide to
leave it, ask the establishment to lower it, or
scratch it off altogether as a payable.
If there is a shortage of backroom workers,
firms must pay them more directly to retain
their services. In turn, firms should raise
their prices or settle for lower profits. That is
up to them to decide.
Both customers and firms have a choice
which they should exercise.
14 ThurSDay, 28 SepTember 2023
New Delhi BUSINESS OF LIFE CULTURE LIVEMINT.COM

When Farooq Abdullah

took over from the Lion
This excerpt from a new
book on Farooq
Abdullah details the Priyanshu Painyuli and Wamiqa Gabbi
drama when he was
‘crowned’ leader of the
National Conference
A cozy but thin
Ashwini Bhatnagar & RC Ganjoo
feedback@livemint.com
Agatha Christie
adaptation
T
he formal take-over of the party
by the 44-year-old son of a
75-year-old father was a grand
event, and governmental
machinery was pressed into ser-
This Vishal Bhardwaj series gets in its
vice to ensure the ‘crowning moment’ went off own way with some whimsical choices
without a hitch. An undeclared holiday was
observed in all offices and educational institu-
tions to mark the ‘national festival.’ Uday Bhatia
Farooq started the ‘historic’ day by leading a uday.b@htlive.com
noisy and unruly procession through the main

M
streets of the city. A vast crowd, by one’s esti- ohan Rawat (Lalit Parimoo) is a big Hindi film fan, to the
mate of about half a million, followed him, extent that he offers Shammi Kapoor and Asha Parekh
cheering the new leader. Groups of men danced as alibi. The night of the murder of his brother, Brigadier
to the beat ‘National, National. All are National.’ Meherban Rawat (Gulshan Grover), he was in a movie hall,
A visibly pleased Farooq egged them on, waving watching Teesri Manzil. But he hasn’t thought things through,
his arms in rhythm with the beat of the chants. and amateur sleuth Charlie Chopra (Wamiqa Gabbi) soon has
Sheikh Abdullah and his family watched the him mixing up Prem Nath and Prem Chopra. It’s very Vishal
triumphal march from the balcony of Lal Rukh Bhardwaj to set an old Hindi film trap. But it’s also true that this
Hotel. The ageing Lion of Kashmir gathered six-episode series (on SonyLiv), an adaptation of Agatha Christie’s
flowers in his hands again and again, and show- The Sittaford Mystery, falls into traps as easily as Mohan does.
ered them upon his son. Two other national The biggest of these traps is Charlie breaking the fourth wall.
political stalwarts, H.N. Bahuguna and Chan- She does it seconds after we’re introduced to her, and in almost
drajeet Yadav, joined Sheikh Abdullah in pour- all her scenes after that. This is more fourth-wall-breaking than
ing their blessings on the son-rise. is good for one’s health, and it’s particularly distracting in scenes
Hours later, the procession arrived at Iqbal about five months in the Sheikh casting the dice a strained friendship. They tried to bury the where suspense is building. It’s not that Gabbi does it badly but
Park, the venue of the National Conference in favour of Farooq. hatchet for good, but hostility erupted fre- it’s obviously Fleabag-derived and the frequency is a problem.
meeting to appoint Sheikh Abdullah’s succes- The primary dissent to the son’s supremacy quently between the two. At a séance attended by Mohan, his wife (Neena Gupta), their
sor. The Park was crowded with 4,000 dele- was from within the family itself. G.M. Shah, the At the August 21 rally too, crowds gave vent to ailing son (Pulkit Makol), relatives (Paoli Dam and Imaad Shah),
gates of the party. The long-time party presi- party’s strongman and the Sheikh’s son-in-law, their feelings against the Congress (I) when they neighbour (Ratna Pathak Shah) and a ghazal singer (Lara Dutta),
dent rose and affixed the National Conference who was also the Works Minister in the State raised ‘Where is Congress? Where is Congress?’ Brigadier Rawat’s death is foretold by a psychic (Naseeruddin
badge on Dr Farooq Abdullah’s chest. He then Cabinet, was unhappy at being overlooked for slogans while Farooq was being installed as the Shah). His army buddy Colonel Barua (Baharul Islam) sets off in
guided him to the presidential chair. A thunder- the job. Shah’s nephew, Mohiuddin Shah, gen- party chief. The Congress represented the Cen- a blizzard to his home to check on him. Sure enough, he’s dead.
ous roar of approval went up as the new presi- eral secretary of the NC, was miffed too. He was tre. The Sheikh had carefully cultivated an anti- A suspect is soon arrested: Jimmy (Viv-
dent took his seat. in direct competition for political largesse with Centre public stance while simultaneously Charlie Chopra aan Shah), his nephew, the last person
Sheikh Abdullah began his last presidential Sheikh Nazir, the Sheikh’s adopted son and the emphasising ‘personal friendship’ with the could have been to Enter see his uncle that night.
speech. “After 50 years,” he said with his typical provisional president of the party. Nehru-Gandhi clan. It was a tightrope walk, but Jimmy’s fiancé from Patiala,
flourish, “I get a chance on this historic moment Nazir was making noises, too. “State politics it served an important political purpose for the a dysfunctional complete with her own theme song.
to transfer to the younger generation the trust has entered a new phase and the generation gap Sheikh. family drama Charlie knows Jimmy’s family well
handed over to me by martyrs—I lighted this is to be narrowed down in the interest of the Farooq intervened quickly that day to calm instead of a enough to call his uncle and aunt
torch, and many a storm could not extinguish it party. Unfortunately, our leaders have left the the crowd. “I am totally for conciliation and not murder mystery ‘mama’ and ‘mami’, but she neverthe-
until today when (I) youth uneducated for confrontation with the Centre and all others. less happily sets about poking holes in
transfer (it). Fer- and untrained in all Confrontation leads to destruction as was wit- everyone’s stories. Like Vijay Varma’s
vently, I hope that Dr Farooq threw in his lot with respects,” he said days Farooq of Kashmir nessed in 1947 when India and Pakistan con- inspector in Jaane Jaan—and unlike Vidya Balan’s jumpy sleuth
Farooq shall prove young leaders. He made it before Farooq’s eleva- By Ashwini Bhatnagar fronted each other.” in Neeyat—she visibly enjoys her work, sharing her deductions
worthy of the trust. I tion. He did not think and R.C. Ganjoo, Predictably, he also brought in the personal and revelations with the audience.
transfer my presi- clear that he needed to replace the Sheikh had made published by Fingerprint equation between the Abdullah and the Gandhi Charlie Chopra could easily have been a dysfunctional family
dency to him.” the old with the young the right choice. 332 pages, ₹699 families into the mix. “Rajiv Gandhi telephoned drama instead of a murder mystery. The atmosphere is cozy, with
He then, ironically, Farooq was still me and wished me well. You know, there has characters rolling joints, making tea, unwinding by the fireplace
harked back to the ’untrained.’ had shadowed the Sheikh closely, and in the been a life-long relationship between Pandit in old Solang Valley houses. There’s some charm to this
history of the Congress Party to justify the Farooq threw in his lot with young leaders as eyes of the NC workers, he was the Sheikh’s nat- Nehru and my father, and also with the late Fer- approach, but also an Ocean’s Twelve lassitude, a feeling that not
‘crowning’ of his son. He recalled the moment soon as he took over. He made it clear that he ural successor. But with Farooq’s coming, their oze Gandhi and Mrs Gandhi. I want to further everyone’s operating at full capacity. Ratna Pathak Shah is sharp
when, at the 1929 session of the Indian National needed to replace the old with the young. “I will hopes had been dashed; however, the question my friendship on a similar pattern with Rajiv.” as ever and the lilt in Baharul Islam’s voice is lovely. Priyanshu
Congress, Pandit Motilal Nehru passed the induce a larger number of youth to join me in of who would take over after the Sheikh as Chief But before he could clarify the issue, his Painyuli, playing a muckraking journalist who teams up with
reigns of leadership to his son Jawaharlal. the organizational set-up,” he said. Minister was still open. The Sheikh occasionally father burst out against the national broadcast- Charlie, is a delight. But there are actors who seem to be phoning
Moti Lal Nehru, also a Kashmiri, had quoted The party’s old guard did not take the state- hinted at Shah as a good choice for the position ers—Doordarshan and All India Radio. He it in or are awkwardly cast. Tassaduq Hussain has been a wonder-
from 13th century Persian poet Sheikh Saadi, “If ment kindly. Farooq retreated and tried to play in an attempt, perhaps, to preserve the peace in accused them of not covering the ‘historic occa- ful cinematographer for Bhardwaj, but the dour, flat look of some
the father doesn’t accomplish the task, the son both the sides. “I shall be combining old and the household. sion’ of Farooq’s installation in full measure. of the indoor scenes isn’t easy on the eyes.
can,” as a reason for the political succession. The new together. Respect for the elders can never Apart from party wrangling, Farooq faced an Moved by the frenzied accusations of his Bhardwaj and Gabbi have collaborated on a couple of short
Sheikh did likewise. die, and the youth can’t be ignored,” he said in imminent threat from the dominant Opposition father against the Central government, Farooq films, but this is their first extended project together. Their part-
Jawaharlal’s succession was through com- a conciliatory tone even as he was raring to party in the State—the Congress. It was in power rose, turned towards his father, and exclaimed nership makes sense—Bhardwaj loves performers who can add
mon consensus among Congress leaders. But break loose from a party hierarchy largely com- at the Centre and virtually controlled the politi- dramatically, “I will not be your son if I do not eccentric touches and Gabbi is all arched eyebrows and knowing
public enthusiasm notwithstanding, the posed of old loyalists who owed allegiance to his cal process in the Valley. shake all of India.” glances as Charlie. It’s a confident comic turn in search of better
moment of transition for Farooq was a fractured brother-in-law G.M. Shah. Farooq was also well aware that though the He lived up to the promise in later years. writing and fewer imposed gimmicks. This is Bhardwaj’s first
one. Sheikh Abdullah had bequeathed leader- Shah had consolidated his hold over the party Abdullahs needed the Congress’ support to stay series as director; it has his imprint, but feels underdeveloped,
ship to the young dynast without getting his network in the six years during which the in power, it could not be trusted. The relation- Extracted with permission from ‘Farooq of thin. He has another thriller out next month, a film called Khu-
seasoned colleagues fully on board. The discus- Sheikh Abdullah government was in power, fol- ship between Congress (I) (as the Congress was Kashmir’’ by Ashwini Bhatnagar and R.C. Gan- fiya. Maybe that’ll be more of a painting. Charlie Chopra feels like
sions—polite and discreet—led to a delay of lowing the Indira-Sheikh Accord of 1975. He then known) and the NC was, therefore, one of joo, published by Fingerprint Publishing. a sketch.

From savoury to sweet: The great Indian miso migration

Miso is increasingly being an alkaloid that chelates heavy metals, amount of trial and error involved before
such as radioactive strontium, and dis- achieving the desired end product. But it’s
used in desserts and charges them from the body. an enjoyable and rewarding process.”
even cocktails as An equally important discovery, at least Also going down the miso-caramel ice
for me, was the fact that miso need not cream route is Amadora gourmet ice
India takes a shine even contain soybeans. Apparently, peas- cream in Chennai. Currently out of stock,
to the soybean paste ants and farm hands in Japan were once
forbidden to use the soybeans they har-
the ice creamery hopes to soon bring back
this bestselling flavour to its two city out-
vested to make their own miso. So, they lets in Kilpauk and Velachery.
Raul Dias used broken rice, or other grains such as Taking the whole non-savoury applica-
feedback@livemint.com millet and barley instead. In fact, I even tion of miso on another tangent is the Miso
came across a miso made of chickpeas Caliente cocktail on offer at Mumbai’s Pan

D
espite being one of the hallmarks
of Japanese cuisine, miso (much
like the other staple of ramen) orig-
inated in China. It was first introduced to
Japan 1,300 years ago by Buddhist priests.
The samurai adopted miso as a vital part of
their diet thanks to its restorative powers.
Yet, it wasn’t these bits of trivia that
piqued my interest.
Of all the miso nuggets I have gleaned
over the years, the one that grabbed me
most was how, during the Chernobyl dis-
aster in Ukraine on 26 April 1986, many
Europeans consumed miso soup as a pre-
ventive measure against radiation dis-
eases. And that is because this thick,
highly savoury, umami flavour-imparting
paste—produced by fermenting soybeans
with salt and kōji (the fungus aspergillus
oryzae)—is said to contain a very impor-
tant ingredient. That is dipilocolonic acid,
here in India of all places. But more about
that a little later.
MISO SWEET
What brings this flavour bomb of a condi-
ment to the forefront of this piece is not its
very obvious savoury dish ingredient
underpinnings. Sure, our taste buds have
been introduced to miso in a hearty sea-
weed-tofu-miso soup, as an unctuous
salad dressing teamed with sesame paste
or as a marinade for a grilled seabass at
myriad Japanese restaurants all over
India. But are we truly ready to munch on
a miso-fronted cookie or sip on a cocktail
that pays homage to it? Sure, say a host of
pastry chefs and mixologists across the
country that I’ve come across in the recent
past.
“While miso is definitely not for the
faint-hearted, those who understand the
Banana bread with tahini and miso at KMC*; (right) Miso Caliente cocktail at Koko.
contrast of flavours it imparts to a dessert,
appreciate it. Miso has an umami saltiness
to it and it works really well with some-
thing like bittersweet chocolate,” says
Chef Bani Nanda, of the New Delhi-based
Miam Patisserie. For her part, Nanda has
recently worked on dessert that’s made
with a miso ganache, a yuzu crumble and
topped with seasonal fruits.
Putting a spin on a classic oatmeal
cookie, Mumbai restaurant Sequel does a
very unique miso, Kashmiri walnut and
brown butter cookie that’s sweetened
with coconut sugar. The only major twist
being that the miso used here is not the de
rigueur soybean one, but a rather outré
house-made chickpea miso.
AN ICY TWIST
Taking the rather clichéd banana bread
and jazzing it up with a tahini caramel and
sending it off with a miso ice cream and a
garnish of toasted pumpkin seeds and wal-
nuts is Niyati Rao, partner-chef at Mum-
bai’s KMC*. And it was the remarkable ver-
satility of miso that made it harmonise
beautifully with this dessert, says Rao.
Though she does speak of it as a rather
exacting ingredient. “When you’re work-
ing with an unconventional ingredient like
miso, the challenge lies in not knowing
exactly how it will behave. There’s a fair
Asian restobar Koko. Curated by Yao Lu
from Union Trading Company, Shang-
hai—which was Asia’s number 45 for 2022
as part of the World’s 50 Best Bars—this
umami forward scotch cocktail is the sum
of its red miso paste, honey and nori (sea-
weed) parts.
“To accentuate the rich and distinct
characteristics of miso, we combine miso
honey with blended scotch, where honey
enriches both the sweetness and body of
the beverage. The finishing touch
includes a subtle hint of red chili tincture,
elevating the overall drinking experi-
ence,” says Vineeth Krishnan, the restau-
rant’s beverage manager.
Miso truly seems to be having an out-
ing for itself like never before in its new
avatar as that secret mystery dessert
ingredient. One that will have your taste
buds in a tizzy.