OPINION, P6 ECONOMY, P2 AKHILESH TILOTIA Use notional savings on the deficit front to create climate fund COMPANIES, P4 EDITORIAL FTA UPGRADE FUTURE-READY Good conduct must match success; regulators must take notice of both Paytm and alleged Grover episodes India-South Korea meet: Goyal and Yeo agree to fast-track trade talks ‘Businesses can improve productivity, affordability of products via tech intensity’ BENGALURU, WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 12, 2022 FOLLOW US ON TWITTER & FACEBOOK. APP AVAILABLE ON APP STORE & PLAYSTORE WWW.FINANCIALEXPRESS.COM READ TO LEAD VOL XXXIV NO. 224, 12 PAGES, `6.00 P U B L I S H E D F R O M : A H M E D A B A D , B E N G A L U R U , C H A N D I G A R H , C H E N N A I , H Y D E R A B A D , K O C H I , K O L K ATA , L U C K N O W, M U M B A I , N E W D E L H I , P U N E SENSEX: 60,616.89 ▲ 221.26 NIFTY: 18,055.75 ▲ 52.45 NIKKEI 225: 28,222.48 ▼ 256.08 HANG SENG: 23,739.06 ▼ 7.48 `/$: 73.91 ▲ 0.13 `/€: 83.76 ▲ 0.09 BRENT: $81.78 ▲ $0.91 GOLD: `47,500 ▲ `85 IN THE NEWS Govt mulls easing curbs on certain Chinese investment INDIA IS CONSIDERING easing scrutiny on certain FDI as early as next month, according to sources, after rules mainly aimed at China created a bottleneck for inflows, reports Bloomberg. The move is being considered after proposals worth $6 billion were stuck amid the red tape. World Bank sees sharp slowdown in global growth THE WORLD BANK on Tuesday said global growth is expected to decelerate "markedly" to 4.1% in 2022 from 5.5% last year, and drop further to 3.2% in 2023 as pent-up demand dissipates and governments unwind massive fiscal and monetary support provided early in the pandemic, reports Reuters. Urjit Patel appointed AIIB vice-president FORMER RBI GOVERNOR Urjit Patel was on Tuesday appointed as vice-president for investment operations in South Asia at the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), reports PTI. SC reserves its order on Future Retail’s plea THE SUPREME COURT on Tuesday reserved its order on Future Retail’s plea seeking nod to go ahead with the regulatory approvals for its `24,713-crore merger deal with Reliance Retail, reports fe Bureau in New Delhi. Sugar exports slow as global prices correct, rupee firms INDIAN MILLS ARE holding off on signing new sugar export contracts as falling global prices and a firm rupee have widened the gap between local and global rates, industry officials told Reuters. COVID CURBS Private offices, bars, restaurants shut in Delhi as cases surge Private offices, till now operating with 50% capacity, to switch to work from home Restaurants allowed to service home delivery and take away orders A health worker takes swab sample of a passenger at the New Delhi Railway Station PRESS TRUST OF INDIA New Delhi, January 11 ` Goal Savings Investing Spending Earning Continued on Page 2 Govt to become largest Voda-Idea shareholder To hold 35.8% in telco as the company’s board opts for converting interest on dues into equity FE BUREAU New Delhi, January 11 Post conversion equity structure: ● Govt: 35.8% ● Vodafone Group: 28.5% ● Aditya Birla Group: 17.8% ■ NPV of the interest amount: VODAFONE IDEA'S BOARD on Tuesday informed the department of telecommunications (DoT) that itwill opt for converting the interest on adjusted gross revenue (AGR) and spectrum dues into government equity.Once the plan goes through over a period of fouryears,thegovernmentwill become the single largest shareholder in the company with a stake of 35.8%. Post the equity conversion, the government will also `16,000 CRORE 14.0 13.4 12.8 12.2 11.6 11.0 13.4 Equity shares will be issued to the govt at par value of `10 per share subject to the final confirmation by DoT ■ Vodafone Idea's total AGR dues: `58,254 CRORE ■ Paid so far: `7,854 CRORE Previous close: 14.85 11.8 Vodafone Idea (BSE) Open Close become a creditorforthe company, which would have some positives as well as negatives forVodafone Idea.On the positive side, the company would beinabetterfinancialposition to raise external funds and there will be a possibility of flexibility in future payments to the government. Continued on Page 2 Tata Teleservices takes govt equity conversion route too TATA TELESERVICES (MAHARASHTRA) on Tuesday said it will opt for conversion of the interestrelatedtoAGRduesintoequityandthat post-conversion, the government holding is expected to be about 9.5% in the company, reports fe Bureau in New Delhi.The net present value (NPV) of this interest is expected to Rising distress? benearly`850croreasperthecompany’sbest estimates,subject to confirmation byDoT.The average price of the shares at the relevant date of August 14, 2021, as per the calculation method provided in the DoT communication works out to be about `41.50/share,subject to finalconfirmationbythetelecomdepartment. CAPITAL GAINS Efishery secures $90 m in funding Round led by Temasek, SoftBank, Sequoia India ARYS ADITYA January 11 INDONESIA’S EFISHERY HAS raised $90 million from a Series C funding round led by Temasek, SoftBank Vision Fund 2 and Sequoia Capital India, the agritech start-up saidinastatementonTuesday. Existing investors, including NorthstarGroup,Go-Ventures, Aqua-Spark and Wavemaker Partners,also participated. The agritech start-up said the proceeds from the round will be used to scale up eFishery’splatformandtostrengthen itsdigitalproducts.Thestart-up targetstoexpanditsbusinesses ■ Existing investors, including Northstar Group, Go-Ventures andAqua-Spark, also participate in the Series C round ■ Proceedswill be used to scale up eFishery’s platform and to strengthen its digital products ■ eFishery targets to expand businesses in top 10 countries in aquaculture, such as India and China ■ Start-up aims to acquire 1 million farmers in 3-5 years in top 10 countries in aquaculture,such as Indiaand China. Continued on Page 2 DMI Fin raises $47 m Rupeek raises $34 m DMI FINANCE ON Tuesday announced the closure of a $47-million equity investment round that saw participation from Japan’s largest trust bank, Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank, among others, reports fe Bureau in Mumbai. The latest fundraise takes NBFC’s total equity base to $500 million. RUPEEKFINTECH,Astart-up that lends against gold as collateral,raised $34 million to accelerate its efforts to monetise India’s $1.5-trillionprivatestashofthemetal, reports Bloomberg. It received backing from investors,includingLightboxand GGV, taking its valuation to $634 million. ■ Page 9 SURYA SARATHI RAY MG-NREGS work demand at a 4-month high After the recent peak in June-July 2021, the months that followed the second Covid surge, work (person days) done under MG-NREGS dipped, even as the fall in demand has been less sharp. Demand for work rose to a four-month high in December, reflecting early signs of reverse migration from urban areas and in tandem with a rise in unemployment rate 70 60 Persons who demanded work (cr) Person days generated (cr, RHS) 14.16 50 45.2 40 5 Unemployment rate (%) 7 25.79 5 4 3 20 2 10 0 2 Apr 2020 7.91 7.74 6 30 6.97 6.86 1 Dec Jan Source: Rural development ministry, CMIE Jun 3.1 0 Dec 2021 Sep Oct Nov 2021 Dec RENEWABLE POWER Why you need to set a retirement goal today ` ` `` ` Delhiwas reviewed at a DDMA meeting on Monday under chairmanship of the Lt Governor in which chief minister Arvind Kejriwal was also present.“Ithas beenobserved that numbers of Covid-19 cases (including the cases of Omicronvariant) havebeen rapidly increasing over the last few days and positivity rate has crossed 23%,”the order said. “Therefore, it has been felt necessary that some more additional restrictions are required to be imposed in Delhi to contain the spread of Covid-19 virus, including the highly contagious and transmissible Omicron variant,” stated the order. THE DELHI GOVERNMENT on Tuesday directed closure of all private offices, except those in exempted categories,amid rising number of Covid cases. The private offices,which were till now operating with 50% work force,have been asked to follow thepracticeofworkfromhome. AnorderissuedbytheDelhi Disaster Management Authority also directed for closing of restaurantsandbarsinthecity. However,restaurantshavebeen allowed to service home delivery and take away orders. The freshrestrictionswillcomeinto force with immediate effect andcontinuetillfurtherorders. The Covid-19 situation in Special Feature ` ` Exempted category include banks, companies providing essential services, media, among others RESCUE PLAN Financial decisions you make now can go a long way to ensure that you enjoy your golden years. So set a retirement corpus target today and work towards achieving it ■ Personal Finance, P7 QuickPicks Madras HC dismisses SpiceJet’s plea against winding-up order THE MADRAS High Court on Tuesday dismissed the appeal by SpiceJet against the single-judge order to wind up the low-cost airline on a Credit Suisse AG's petition relating to non-payment of $24 million to SR Technics, a maintenance and repair company, reports fe Bureau in Chennai. The high court extended the suspension of the order till January 28, to enable the airline to move a further appeal before the Supreme Court. The Madras High Court had on December 6 ordered the winding up of the airline and also directed an official liquidator to take over the assets of the airline. PAGE 10 GM directed to pay 50% of salary to retrenched workers GRANTING PARTIAL relief to the retrenched workers of the General Motors plant in Maharashtra, an industrial court in Pune has directed the automaker to pay 50% of salary to 1,086 workers as an interim relief, reports Geeta Nair in Pune. The wages will have to be paid from April 7, 2022, till the final disposal of the complaint. Sardar Rajekhan Tamboli, member, industrial court, ruled that prima facie there was a case of unfair labour practice. Tamboli said that if an interim relief of partial wages was not granted, the employees would suffer irreparable loss. PAGE 4 Green capacity nears Paris pact target, but generation gap wide ANUPAM CHATTERJEE New Delhi, January 11 INDIAIS CLOSEtomeetingthe 40% target for green power share in installed capacity (Under2015Parisaccord,thisis to be met by 2030). But since the gap between green power capacity and production from these sources is characteristically larger than the same for conventionalfossil-basedunits, the country has still a long way to go before attaining a similar levelforrenewableenergyshare in actual powergeneration. When the target of having 40% installed power capacity from non-fossil fuel based sources by 2030 was set in the 2015 Paris climate agreement, theshareofsuchpowerplantsin India’s electricity capacity was just29%.Althoughtheshareof non-emittingsourcesintheinstalled power capacity has now Installed power capacity FY16 Current (in Giga Watt) 305 392 Total 185 209 Coal Green* 89 Share of green in total installed capacity 151 *Solar,wind, hydro, etc. 29.2 38.5 (%) Generation Share of green (%) 15.9 22.8^ ^April-Dec 2021 reached38.5%,theseplantsare producing less than 23% of powergeneratedinthecountry. Continued on Page 2 Tata replaces Vivo as IPL title sponsor THE TATA GROUP, one of India’s largest business conglomerates,will replace Chinese mobile manufacturer Vivo as the Indian Premier League’s title sponsor for the next twoyears,reports PTI. As per sources,Tatas will pay around `670 crore for two yearswhileVivowillpay`454 crore for termination of contract,makingitawin-winsituation for the BCCI as it is set to earn a whopping `1,124 crore for seasons 2022 and 2023,respectively. ■ Page 4 BENGALURU