West Bengal commissioner of commercial taxes MN Roy has warned that severe penalties and stringent actions would be taken against the jute mills in the state which were taking undue advantage by showing false returns on stock transfers. Speaking at the 74th annual general meeting of Gunny Trades' Association in Calcutta on Wednesday, Roy said state finance minister Ashim Dasgupta wanted to give a new lease of life to this sector, but attitude of jute mills was far from satisfactory. Citing reasons for these, he said returns submitted by a large number of mills in the first quarter ended June 30, 1999 specially on stock transfer, were not found to be true. Even in some cases, it was found that stock transfer from one state to other as claimed by the mills did not take place at all, he said. He, however, said without further verification, we cannot say whether the contents mentioned in the returns are true or false, but it is illogical to accept a six per centincrease in stock transfers cases compared to what was in the same quarter last fiscal. Roy said we request you to be fair as next quarter returns would have to be submitted in October and stringent measures and penalties would be imposed, if things were found to be incorrect after physical verification.

Gold ease in Europe

Gold eased in early Europe on Thursday but traders expected subdued business despite lower lease rates, as market participants remained wary ahead of next week's British gold auction. One-month gold lease rates eased to around 4.23 per cent from Wednesday's 4.85 as lending entered the market, improving liquidity. But dealers said they expected gold to remain quiet with nobody prepared to take out large positions ahead of next Tuesday's Bank of England auction of 25 tonnes of official gold reserves. Spot gold was last quoted at $255.70/$256.20 a troy ounce, down from the New York close at $256.50/$257.00. It was fixed at $255.70 from Wednesday's afternoon fix at $257.15. Goldweakened in New York on Wednesday on fund selling with stops triggered around $256.50.``People are just looking for a way to exit before the auction. I don't think people want to be eager buying gold ahead of an 800,000 ounce auction,'' one dealer said. Next week's auction is the second in a series of such sales aimed at reducing Britain's stockpile of gold reserves from 715 tonnes to 300.

Water management policy

The Kerala irrigation minister VP Ramakrishna Pillai on Thursday said the state lacked an effective water management policy. Inaugurating a workshop on `Design flood estimation for small and medium catchments,' jointly organised by the Central Water Commission (CWC) and the Kerala irrigation department here, he said that though the state had 44 rivers, there was acute water shortage for various purposes in certain parts and floods elsewhere and therefore a meaningful scientific study was needed to tackle the issue. When development projects like road rail bridges, dams and spillways wereundertaken, vital parameters such as the abundance and variation of water flow through the channels at the project area were seldom taken into account, he said. The CWC, after consultations with other departments and also taking stock of the water let off, had developed a model to estimate flood in the small and medium catchment areas which included Malabar coast areas.

US farm rescue plan

The White House, on the sidelines for months, said on Wednesday it ``generally agrees'' with a plan to provide an emergency $7.65 billion in farm relief, but aid should be targeted to smaller farmers and those ``most in need.'' The 10-page letter did not suggest how to meet that goal. It renewed administration criticism of the ``Freedom to Farm'' law that deregulated farming in 1996 and proposed several modifications, among them a four-million-acre expansion of the Conservation Reserve and keeping the dairy price support programme, now slated to expire on December 31. ``The Freedom to Farm bill is failing,''White House budget director Jacob Lew wrote to congressional leaders, because it provides no additional support when prices slump.``In addition, the aid package must include crop and livestock loss assistance to help farmers and ranchers recover from the drought in the East and other natural disasters around the country.'' Last month, the Senate passed a $7.65 billion farm rescue package. The bulk of the money, $5.54 billion, would be cash payments to farmers, duplicating the annual subsidies guaranteed under the 1996 farm law.