Business News at 10:00 am on 20th May, 2024

Let’s begin, Vodafone Idea has cleared its dues to the government till the December quarter, comprising revenue share licence fee and spectrum usage charges, totalling around Rs 1,000 crore. These are concurrent dues, which are not covered by the four-year moratorium. Department of telecommunications sources said that the company now needs to clear the dues related to the January-March quarter, which is around Rs 800 crore. The company has paid 10% of the amount the balance needs to be cleared, officials said. Queries sent to Vodafone Idea did not elicit any response till the time of going to the press. Vodafone Idea’s total adjusted gross revenue dues arising from the Supreme Court 2019 order stands at Rs 58,254 crore.
Moving to Markets, Election times have been usually good for benchmark indices, at least in the first few months. But market participants seem to be unusually nervous this time around. Both the key benchmark indices – Sensex and Nifty – had risen barely 2.4% and 3.5% respectively till last weekend – the worst performance since 2004. The gains are also due to the last few sessions when the market mood seems to have improved. The India VIX – the measure of volatility expected in the next 30 days – is up 40% to 20.5. Interestingly, except in the 2004 elections, when the benchmark indices were trading in the negative in the aftermath of the Iraq war, the General Election period has usually been stock investor friendly.
Moving on to Economy news, the one-time amnesty scheme for exporters who failed to meet obligations that they had agreed upon while availing duty-free imports of inputs and machinery for production has netted the government Rs 852 crore, a senior official has said. As many as 6,705 applications were filed by the exporters to take advantage of the scheme, which enabled them to reduce their paybacks to the government for not meeting export obligations under the Advanced Authorisation (AA) and Export Promotion Capital Goods (EPCG) schemes. Officials said the money collected under the scheme could go up further. In the normal course, if an exporter fails to meet the export obligations, the duty saved has to be paid back to the government.
In another story in the Economy section, More than seven thousand farmers’ collectives across various states are now able to sell unique agricultural products including rice, pulses, millets, honey, mushrooms, spices, and value-added products on the government’s e-commerce platform — Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC). ONDC is being promoted as an alternative to global e-commerce giants such as Amazon and Walmart, supporting small enterprises. Since the farmers producer organisations (FPOs) started joining the ONDC platform in April 2023, more than 7,020 such entities, out of 8,500 registered entities with the government so far, have sold as many as 3,100 varieties of value-added agricultural products using the facility. The network has more than 30 digital applications including Mystore, PayTM, Magicpin, and Delhivery.
Over to an important update from the Personal Finance section, as individuals prepare to file income tax returns, adopting a strategic approach can alleviate stress and ensure ease of compliance. Even though return filing has now become automated and all the relevant information is just fingertips away, this checklist will streamline your tax filing process. Form 26AS gives taxpayers details of TDS and TCS during the relevant year. It can be downloaded easily from the e-filing portal. Check that the amounts of income and TDS / TCS are appropriate. In addition to TDS / TCS, AIS reports savings account interest, dividend, rent received, purchase and sale transactions of securities / immovable properties, foreign remittances, interest on deposits, GST turnover and others.
Some more from Industry news, Adani group is stepping up efforts to strengthen its team for its retail and hospitality foray. Adani Realty, the real estate arm of Adani Group, has advertised jobs in the retail and F&B (food and beverages) segment on networking platforms such as LinkedIn. The company recently also hired Rajendra Kalkar, who was president – malls and director at Phoenix Mills, as the business head of its malls and hospitality division. As part of its retail and hospitality foray, the group is working on city-side developments near or within airports, wherein it will build shopping centres, multiplex, food courts, spa and so on, sources said. An email sent to Adani Group did not elicit any response.
Lastly, both the stock exchanges will remain shut on Monday, May 20 due to elections in Mumbai. Thirteen constituencies will go for polling which includes Mumbai South, Mumbai North-Central, Mumbai North, Mumbai, North-East, Mumbai North-West, and Mumbai South-Central. The trading is halted in the cash market as well as the F&O segment. During the Special trading session conducted on May 18, the Indian equity indices closed higher. The Nifty 50 advanced 36 points or 0.16% to settle the day’s trading at 22,502.