Sabarmati Gas, a company promoted by Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation Limited and Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited, is planning to raise Rs 140 crore by offering equity stake to strategic partners at a premium.

According to the sources, Investment banker SBI Caps has been given the task of searching for a strategic partner to take a 50% stake in Gujarat-based gas retailer Sabarmati Gas.

Indian Public Sector Gas major GAIL India Ltd has registered a net profit before tax at Rs 1,098 crore in the fourth quarter of 2007-08, against Rs 546 crore for the corresponding period in 2006-07.

The profit before tax during the year 2007-08 rose 35% to Rs 3,855 crore from Rs 2,860 crore in 2006-07.

GAIL also plans to invest Rs 3,410 crore ($810 million) during financial year 2008-09 in pipeline project, petroleum chemicals, business development, projects related to telecom, and city gas among others.

Further it also plans to buy five to six liquefied natural gas (LNG) cargoes from the spot market in the last quarter of fiscal 2008/09 for its Dabhol power plant.

In order to meet up the shortage of coal at its power plants in India, NTPC is looking to acquire majority stakes in Indonesian coal mines having reserves of around 200-300 million tons.

The deal is likely to finalize by the end of the existing fiscal, ending Mar. 31, 2009.

R S Sharma, chairman and managing director of NTPC, said that the company has already nominated three merchant bankers for the purpose.

But Mr. Sharma declined to give the names of the bankers and other details.

Vienna  - A 150-million-euro (232-million-dollar) deal between Austria's main carrier Austrian Airlines (AUA) and a key Saudi investor was off because of "impossible conditions" set by the investor, Austrian news reports said on Monday.

Talks between Saudi businessman Mohamed bin Issa al-Jaber and Austrian Airlines had been shelved for the time being, a spokeswoman for Austria's privatization holding OIAG, the airline's main shareholder, was quoted as saying by the Austrian Press Agency.

Coal India subsidiary Bharat Coking Coal Ltd (BCCL), which operates mines in Jharkhand and West Bengal, will invest Rs 1200 crore. The company plans to spend the amount on buying equipment used in all our operative mines across the two states, as part of its revival strategy.

BCCL has set a target of producing 26.5 million tonnes (MT) of coking coal in the current financial year and will further increase the production volume to 30 MT by 2011-12.

India's state-run petrochemicals company, Mangalore Refinery & Petrochemicals Limited (MRPL), is all set to supply 2,50,000 tons of diesel to Iran over the next eight months, replacing Reliance Industries, a top company official stated. MRPL is a subsidiary of ONGC and has been one of the favorite madcap stocks for traders for the past few months.

This winter Iran was forced to buy diesel from as far a field as Singapore after Reliance Industries, stopped supplies when its bankers refused to confirm letter of credit raised by Iran's central bank. This happened as a result of increasing Western pressure over Tehran's nuclear programme.

PSU Power equipment maker Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd (BHEL) plans to spend around Rs 500 crore on R&D during the current financial year. BHEL, in an official release stated that it has spent Rs 464.4 crore on R&D in 2007-08, which was 94.3 per cent higher compared to Rs 239 crore spent last year. This is the highest spending on R&D so far and is over two per cent of the company's total turnover of Rs 21,680 crore

Further, the company is looking at spending around Rs 900 crore on various R&D activities by 2011-12.

(BHEL) has won orders worth Rs 3,368 crore from Chhattisgarh State Electricity Board for supplying and installing power equipments for its running and upcoming projects.

The orders envisage setting up of one unit of 500 mw at Korba West thermal power project and two units of 500 mw each at the upcoming Marwa thermal power project. These units will add 36 million units every day to the grid on commissioning.

Bhel's contract in the project would include design, engineering, manufacturing, supply, commissioning of steam turbines, generators and boilers.

State-run Power equipment manufacturer Bharat Heavy Electricals (BHEL) and the country's largest power producer NTPC have formed a 50:50 joint venture company christened, NTPC-BHEL Power Project Pvt. Ltd.

NTPC and BHEL had, in September last year, decided to form a joint venture to execute power projects in India and abroad. The joint venture will carry out Engineering Procurement and Construction (EPC) contract for power plants and infrastructure projects as well as manufacture and supply equipment in India and abroad.

Second largest manufacturer of earthmoving equipment in Asia, Bharat Earth Movers Ltd (BEML) has entered into a joint venture agreement with Hyderabad-based Midwest Limited and Sumbermitra Jaya of Indonesia to enter into mining sector.

The joint venture, named BEML Midwest Limited, would provide total mining solutions, right from mine development to mine management and maintenance.

BEML was keen to tap the potential available in mining operations, a company spokesman said in a statement.

Public sector undertaking, BEML Limited is a premier ISO 9001-2000 Company in India. The company commands 70% market share in domestic earthmover industry. Nearly 40% of its equity has been divested to financial institutions and public.

PTC India has announced that the company has raised Rs 1,200 crore through the qualified institutional placement (QIP) route. After the issue, company’s paid-up capital has increased to Rs 227.41 crore from Rs 150 crore earlier.

The company has allotted 7.41 crore equity shares of Rs 10 each at an issue price of Rs 155 per share aggregating Rs 1,199.94 crore in favor of qualified institutional buyers (QIBs), an official release stated.

The Cabinet Committee has finally approved the Initial Public Offer (IPO) of Rites. The RITES public issue proposal came up for consideration on Thursday at the meeting of union cabinet, presided over by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

Rites, a government of India enterprise is a consultancy organisation in the fields of transport, infrastructure and related technologies. The organisation plans to launch the IPO in the next 3-4 months.

P. Chindambaram, Finance Minister, Said, “Rites will sell 10 million new shares through an initial public offering later this year, while Indian Railways will sell four million of its shares in the company through the IPO.”

India-based, Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) has become the first railway project in the world to be registered at the UN under the clean development mechanism (CDM) scheme, enabling it to earn carbon credits.

Under the project, DMRC will earn Certified Emission Reductions (CERs) for use of regenerative braking system in its rolling stock (trains).

Railway officials explained that under the RBT system, whenever a train applies brake, the 30% of the energy released by it is conserved and is used by the train coming behind. The total amount of energy thus conserved can be converted into financial terms – CER.

New Delhi, Jan 4 (ANI): Union Finance Minister P
Chidamram and his Japanese counterpart Fukushiro Nukaga met here today,
and called for increasing bilateral collaboration in infrastructure
sector, including the Dedicated Freight Corridor Project and the Delhi
Mumbai Industrial Corridor Project.

They also discussed about boosting collaboration in the financial sector, a government release said.

State-run gas firm, GAIL (India) and Oil India Limited (OIL) have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for joint cooperation in various business areas.

The agreement was signed by GAIL Chairman and Managing Director U. D. Choubey and OIL Chairman and Managing Director M. R. Pasrija.

GAIL (India) Limited, is India's flagship Natural Gas company, integrating all aspects of the Natural Gas value chain (including Exploration & Production, Processing, Transmission, Distribution and Marketing) and its related services.

New Delhi: Steel Authority of India Ltd, State-run steel manufacturer has decided to invest around Rs 1,000 crore on establishing at least three greenfield pellet plants amounting 6 million tons to raise its production capacitance to over 24 million tons by the end of the 11th Plan.

New Delhi: Giving careful consideration to the rising crude oil costs, the administration has decided to issue oil bonds up to Rs 24,000 crore in the existing year (2007).

A top oil ministry functionary stated, “The decision in this regard would be taken before October 15 and the payment would be released by November 15.”

As the demand for coal increases in the country, Coal India Ltd is looking at importing coal to cater the domestic market. As per the industry resources, the rise in demand is due mainly due to coking coal. The country is falling short by 4-5% of the actual demand of coal.

Coal India is looking at Thai, Australian and Indonesian coal fields for importing non-coking coal. Steel companies import coal on their own.

RITES, a Government of India (GoI) enterprise under the Ministry of Railways has declared the final results for the year ended Mar 31, 2007.

The company recorded an increase of 32.9% and 19.2% in revenue and profit after tax (PAT) correspondingly, in the financial year ended Mar. 31, 2007. The earnings and PAT at Rs 5.66 billion and Rs 1.18 billion respectively, is the highest ever attained by the company.

Orissa: Public Sector Steel maker Steel Authority of India (SAIL) announced its plans to expand its facility at the Rourkela Steel Plant by investing more than of Rs 7,800 crore. The capacity of RSP will be increased to 4 million tonnes per annum from current 2.2 million tonnes p.a. The expansion plan is expected to finish by June, 2010. The plant may also see newest technology and SAIL plans to invest in many other units as well.

SAIL has shown great results in the past few quarters. The PSU unit was making big losses for many years before the turn-around.

Company's director for personnel and raw materials G Ojha informed that the production capacity will be further increased in next decade. The development plan will be finished in phases.