News

• Five Federations representing about five lakh coal workers in Coal India Limited (CIL)
  and other government-owned coal companies, and Singareni Collieries Company
  Limited (SCCL) have given notice to the Centre that they will observe one-day strike on
  September 24.
• The strike notice served to Chief labour Commissioner, CIL Chairman, Managing
  Director of SCCL and the executives of other public-sector coal companies urged the
  Centre to withdraw the decision to allow 100% FDI in coal mining. The federations have
  also demanded that all subsidiaries of CIL such as ECL, BCCL, CCL, CMPDL, SECL,
  MCL should be merged into CIL and it should be treated as one company.

• On Wednesday (September 4, 2019), Indian rupee gained 27 paise to settle at 72.12
  against the US dollar, in line with a recovery in domestic equities.

• JSW Steel is planning to raise about $350 million (Rs 2,520 crore) from overseas loans,
  which should help it reduce borrowing costs as it navigates a profit margin squeeze due
  to a fall in steel prices and integrates recent acquisitions such as of Monnet Ispat.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and senior ministry officials met representatives of
infrastructure companies like Hindustan Construction Corp, NHAI, Ircon, and others.

They discussed issues related to financing, land, capital and environmental clearances.
There were suggestions on how to speed up execution of projects. They also discussed
standardisation of contract documents to reduce dispute and how difficult it was
becoming for companies to realize cash flows because of arbitration

• Allaying fears of NHAI facing fiscal crisis or high contingent liabilities, its Chairman N N
  Sinha said the Authority was in a “very sound” position with a strong pipeline of projects.
• The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) is on its way to construct about 4,500
  km of projects, higher by about 1,000 km than last year’s 3,300 km of projects, he said.

• To push weakening exports on a higher growth track, Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal
  has called a meeting of stakeholders, including export bodies, to give suggestions on
  trade policy instruments that could stimulate development.