The government’s pilot scheme to reduce power generation cost has been allowed to run
till March 31, 2020. This scheme has saved about Rs 2.75 crore per day in the April-July
period. The Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC) has extended the
implementation period of the scheme to allow Power System Operation Corporation
(Posoco), the national load despatch centre, to fine-tune the operational aspects of the
scheme for large-scale implementation in future.
Leading infrastructure investors including Cube Highways, Macquarie Group, IRB
Infrastructure and Larsen & Toubro (L&T) have sought more time for evaluating the
highways ministry’s third bundle of toll-operate-transfer (TOT) projects, officials said.
National Highways Authority of India invited bids for nine national highway stretches for a
cumulative length of 566 km on June 13 in its third round of TOT auctions. The projects
are spread across Bihar, Jharkhand, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh, with a base value of
around Rs 4,995 crore.
Successful bidders of the current round of coal block auctions can use extracted coal at
any of their plants including those at subsidiaries, provided the end-use plant is similar to
the one specified during the auction. Earlier, operators were tied to the plant specified
during the auction.
Dalmia Cement (Bharat) has put in a bid to acquire the Rs 6,000-crore cement business
of Emami. Though Dalmia Group held initial talks with private equity funds such as
CPPIB (Canada Pension Plan Investment Board) and Piramal-Bain for a joint bid, it has
now decided to go solo and finance the acquisition internally, sources said.
State-run electricity distribution companies (discoms) of Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu
have opposed the central government panel’s recommendation to make advance
payments to power producers. The recommendation was made by a committee which
was constituted by the Union power ministry ‘to look into the issue of delayed payments
by discoms’ to power generators.
At a time when exports are battling a global slowdown, the latest restriction on steel
product imports will add to the woes of India’s engineering goods exporters, said the
Engineering Export Promotion Council (EEPC) as steel is raw material for engineering
goods companies.
In a letter to Union Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal, EEPC Chairman
Ravi Sehgal said a Directorate General of Foreign Trade notification of September 5, in
the name of Steel Import Monitoring System, has mandated compulsory registration for
import of most of the steel products — under Chapter 72 and few products under
Chapter 73 and 86 of ITC (HS).