Budget 2018-19

A gauge of capacity utilisation is also provided by the RBI data on working capital loans   There are early signs of an uptick in capacity utilisation in select sectors, which could be a precursor to an investment revival.Utilisation rates are on the rise in cement, automobile ancillaries, engineering, casting and sheet metals, industry players told Business Standard.A gauge of capacity utilisation is also provided by the RBI data on working capital loans. In line with the trend of rising capacity utilisation rates, working capital loans grew 6.4 per cent in the July-September quarter of 2017-18, up from 4.8 per cent in the preceding quarter. It had plummeted to a low of 1 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2016-17.“Our order intake has risen 20 to 25 per cent in 2017-18, signalling 80 per cent capacity utilisation in certain sectors like cement. Some of the sectors with high orders included food processing, alcohol and the carbon black industry,” said M S Unnikrishnan...

This year, in addition to a serious rain deficit in Vidarbha, the cotton crop was subject to an unprecedented attack of the pink bollworm   More than 30,000 farmers from all over Maharashtra, on a ‘long march’ sicnce March 5 from Nashik, an agricultural powerhouse 170 km north of Mumbai, will reach the state’s legislative Assembly on Monday. Leaders in the protest rally allege their demands for clearing farmers’ balance sheets, ensuring remunerative prices for crops, and implementing the Forest Rights Act for the benefit of scheduled tribes have not been done entirely. An 8 per cent contraction in agriculture (worse, the crop sub-sector contracted 14 per cent), according to the latest economic survey by the state, worsens the situation. The western state received 84 per cent of the average rainfall during the June to October period in the 2017 season, with regional variations. The deficit in the drought-prone Vidarbha region was above 20 per cent. On top of th...

The bench said it was "heartening to know" that number of fatalities and injuries in road accidents have come down   The Centre is in the process of linking driving licences with Aadhaar number to weed out fake licences and a software for this covering all states on a real-time basis is under preparation, the Supreme Court was told on Wednesday. A bench comprising Justices Madan B Lokur and Deepak Gupta was informed about it by a court-appointed committee on road safety headed by former Supreme Court judge Justice K S Radhakrishnan. This assumes significance as a five-judge Constitution bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra is currently hearing a clutch of petitions challenging the constitutional validity of the Aadhaar scheme and the enabling 2016 law. The committee, in its report filed in the top court, said it had held a meeting on November 28 last year with the joint secretary of Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) to discuss several...

The highest percentage of babies with low birth weights was reported from the national capital territory of Delhi   Child health care :  Indian babies are being born heavier than ever, a sign of better-educated, richer and more aware mothers and better healthcare. Only 18% of live births over five years (2010-15) had low birth weight (less than 2.5 kg)–an important indicator of early exposure to childhood morbidity, mortality–down from 22% a decade ago, according to new national health data. The highest percentage of babies with low birth weights was reported from the national capital territory of Delhi, according to the final report of the National Family Health Survey , 2015-16 (NFHS-4), released on January 12, 2018. “Children who weigh less than 2.5 kilograms at birth are considered to have a higher-than-average risk of early childhood death,” the NFHS-4 report said. Started in 1992, the NFHS is an important source of national data on indicators such...

Government has not yet imposed curbs on the cryptocurrency industry that is estimated to be adding 200,000 users in India every month   Economy news : India is planning steps to ensure cryptocurrencies are illegal within its payments system, while at the same time appointing a regulator to oversee unregulated exchanges that trade in "crypto assets," a finance ministry official said on Monday. A panel set by the government to look into issues relating to cryptocurrencies is expected to submit its report in the current fiscal year, ending on March 31, S C Garg, Economic Affairs Secretary, told CNBC TV18 news channel. "The government will take steps to make it illegal as a payment system," he said at a post-budget event telecast by the news channel, adding the trading of "crypto assets" at the unregulated exchanges would be regulated. "We hope now within this financial year the committee will finalise its recommendations ... cert...