Kudankulam protests against nuclear plant: 10 big facts

Chennai:  The 13,000-crore nuclear plant at Kudankulam in coastal Tamil Nadu is now filled with engineers, scientists and other workers. They report to work everyday even as thousands of villagers protest against the nuclear project, which, when completed, will be India's largest nuclear power-generating complex. Here are 10 big developments in this story:

After the Tamil Nadu government gave its go-ahead to the Indo-Russian nuclear project on March 19, after which work at the plant is on in full swing,
1. The Madras High Court today has refused to order the government to lift its ban on public gatherings in and around Radapuram Taluk, where the Kudankulam plant is located. Section 144, which prevents large groups from meeting in an area, was imposed last week by the District Collector.
2. The region has been tense since March 19, when the Tamil Nadu government said operations at the nuclear plant could begin. Activists and thousands of villagers have been holding large camps in protest at Idinthakarai adjoining Kudankulam.
3. They say they are not convinced that the plant is safe. They are also worried about ecological damage by radioactivity which would affect the livelihood of thousands of fishermen.
4. The leader of the protests is Dr SP Udhayakumar, who heads the People's Movement Against Nuclear Energy (PMANE). He said today that there is no question of ending the protest but added that "we are ready for talks. If we are considered people of this country, and if our ahimsa protest is respected, the government should talk to us." He has been on an indefinite fast since March 12 along with 14 supporters.
5. He says that the government has failed to provide any sort of disaster training to the villagers staying in and around the plant site. "People within 30km radius of the Kudankulam plant have not been given any disaster training...Without doing this, they cannot load the nuclear fuel...the Central Government and the State Government would be held liable for this criminal activity if they decide to load the fuel rods without preparing the people," Mr Udhayakumar had said. The government says that's not the case.
6. Work at the plant was suspended in September last year when the Tamil Nadu cabinet asked the Prime Minister to halt all operations till residents in the area were reassured that they were safe.
7. The Prime Minister sent a senior minister, V Narayanasamy, to meet with villagers; atomic and technical experts also audited the plant and reported it safe.
8. Tamil Nadu chief minister J Jayalalithaa last week cleared the project, a day after a crucial election in the area.
9. The plant, being built with the help of the Russians, will see two reactors being commissioned within months of each other. When it's completed, six reactors will generate unprecedented power supply for the state.
10. There is heavy security, including Rapid Action Force personnel, guarding the plant.

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No consensus on Lokpal Bill after all-party meet: 10 big facts

New Delhi:  Will India get the new anti-corruption law it has been waiting for? The Lokpal Bill - named for a national anti-graft agency that it creates - was passed by the Lok Sabha. But the Winter Session of the Rajya Sabha ended before the bill could be put to a vote. The Prime Minister called an all-party meeting today to build consensus before the bill is scheduled for discussion in the Rajya Sabha. The Left says the meeting ended without any consensus. Here are 10 facts on this big story:
1) What is the Lokpal? This is a national agency of nine members, who will be selected by a committee that includes the Prime Minister and Leader of the Opposition. The Lokpal will investigate complaints of corruption against all government servants.  A state-level branch of the Lokpal is called a Lokayukta. 
2) Why did the PM call an all-party meeting today? In December, opposition parties moved close to 200 amendments on the Bill in the Rajya Sabha. They want many changes to the Bill.  The ruling coalition is in a minority in the Rajya Sabha.  In December, the debate on the bill proved that the government would not be able to get the bill passed. Opposition parties say the government therefore orchestrated chaos and delays so that the bill could not be put to a vote which it would have lost. At today's meeting at the PM's house, it was decided that the Lokpal Bill will be taken up during the second half of this Budget Session of Parliament. On March 30, Parliament breaks for three weeks and the union budget has to be passed before this financial year ends. 
3) Before bringing the bill to the Rajya Sabha, the government will work on re-wording contentious parts of the Bill. The BJP, Left and parties like Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress all agree on the need for a Lokpal but have serious objections to the bill in its current form.
 
4) What do opposition parties want?  There are many points of difference among the main parties on the Lokpal Bill. The biggest is whether the bill, in its current form, violates the federal structure of India.  The bill asks for Lokayuktas or ombudsman agencies to be set up in every state to tackle cases of corruption.  Parties like the BJP say this violates the autonomy of state governments. They say that the centre should provide an enabling framework that provides the guidelines for how the ombudsman should be selected and what its powers should be. But it cannot force states to create a Lokayukta.
 
5) How do allies feel about this? The ruling coalition, led by the Congress, has two senior allies - the DMK from Tamil Nadu and Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress from Bengal. Both are needed for the government's survival.  Because both parties are regional, they have joined the BJP in objecting to the references to Lokayuktas, even in the title of the bill.  Mamata Banerjee wants this part of the bill deleted completely.  If the BJP pushes for a vote on this issue, the Trinamool and DMK will vote against the government they belong to.  That means not just embarrassment for the Congress; the government will have been defeated on landmark legislation, allowing the opposition to point out that it does not have the right to stay in office.
6) What powers will the Lokpal have?  This is a major argument among different parties.  Those like the Left say that the Lokpal should supervise the CBI which will be assigned to investigate the complaints received by the ombudsman.  The government says the CBI cannot be made accountable to the Lokpal because this would amount to creating an executive structure outside Parliament.  The bill currently allows the Lokpal to refer complaints to the CBI, which will keep it updated on those cases.   The BJP says the government's control over the CBI should be reduced. The rationale is that as long as the government decides the CBI's budget, and the postings and transfers of its officers, the agency is vulnerable to governmental influence. 
7) Does everyone agree on the need for the Lokpal?  Parties like the BJP have said they want the Lokpal to be introduced as quickly as possible. "I think they should present an amended bill in Parliament; they have got the message loud and clear," BJP leader Arun Jaitley told NDTV today. They blame the government for delaying the legislation in the Rajya Sabha. But others like the Samajwadi Party and Lalu Prasad Yadav's RJD say a Lokpal as currently envisaged creates a new autocratic body. They want the Lokpal Bill to be studied and revised by a parliamentary committee.
 
8) The Anna Hazare factor: The fact that the Lokpal Bill was debated and passed in the Lower House or Lok Sabha was due almost entirely to the efforts of anti-corruption crusader Anna Hazare.  With activist-aides like Arvind Kejriwal, he turned India's attention to this legislation through a series of hunger strikes.  It was his 16-day fast in August last year that brought thousands of people in support every day to his camp at Delhi's Ramlila Maidan.  Anna, who is 74, ended his fast after Parliament assured him that it would consider the Lokpal Bill urgently.  However, Anna says the bill in its current form is pointless.   In particular, his group feels that the Lokpal has no real authority and has been reduced to a "post office" where it will distribute complaints of corruption filed by the public to different officials or departments over whom it has no real control.
9) How the Lokpal will be selected is also contentious: The opposition says that the five-member selection committee for the ombudsman gives the government too much representation. That, they argue, will ensure the Lokpal goes soft on any investigation that the government does not favour.
10) The Prime Minister is covered by the Lokpal - he can be investigated while in office if approved by two-thirds of the Lokpal's nine members.

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CAG's coal report: 10 big facts on this big controversy

New Delhi:  The government is now under fire on account of a report by its auditor that says it lost 10.7 lakh crores because it undervalued coal deposits and did not auction coal fields between 2004 and 2009. Here is your 10-point cheat sheet to this story:
1) The losses are part of a draft report by the government's auditor, the Comptroller and Auditor General, which was leaked to the media.

2) The draft report says 155 coal-fields were allocated to about 100 private and some state-run firms or public sector units in a manner that gave "undue benefits" to the companies. The report said the sale of the blocks was "subjective" and allowed "windfall gains", but does not make allegations of corruption or bribe-taking.

3) This afternoon, the CAG wrote to the Prime Minister's Office and said it was embarrassed by the leak. "The observations which are under discussion at a very preliminary stage ..and hence are exceedingly misleading," the letter allegedly states.

4) The Opposition attacks in Parliament, says the Prime Minister, who supervised the Coal Ministry for some of the period in question, must explain.

5) Coal Minister Sriprakash Jaiswal says ads were placed to invite offers from interested firms, and that BJP state governments, like in Rajasthan, had opposed a process of bidding.

6) India is the world's third-largest coal producer in the world after China and the United States.

7) Analysts and experts say that  an auction would raise power tariffs and that not all coal blocks are profitable or commercially viable. They say CAG has erred in its calculation of losses.

8) State-run power company NTPC says it made no windfall profits from the allocations and that the lower costs meant cheaper electricity for consumers.

9) The Indian subsidiary of ArcelorMittal, and steel makers Tata and Jindal Steel and Power, are among the companies named in the report. Jindal's controlling shareholder, Naveen Jindal, who is also a member of parliament, defended the policy of direct allocations, saying it had allowed private companies to jump-start production at mines left idle by state-run Coal India Limited, the world's single largest producer.

10) Coal fields are currently allocated by a screening committee.  Interested firms are given points for different parameters- whether land and environmental clearances are in place, for example. Parliament last year approved amendment to Mines and Minerals Regulation and Development Act of 1957 to enable the government  to auction coal blocks

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10 big facts on ONGC share auction

New Delhi: 

ONGC shares dipped 1.9% as a last minute bid by Life Insurance Corporation, the state-owned insurer, helped complete the process. The total planned sale was 42.77 crore shares. LIC is believed to have invested close to Rs 4,000 crore. The auction for the shares will help the government raise over Rs 12,000 crore. The sale of ONGC shares is part of the government's divestment programme.  

Here are 10 facts on the ONGC auction:

1) At market close, bids were received for 29.22 crore shares, according to ONGC chairman Sudhir Vasudeva. The company's share price dipped 1.8 per cent after gaining 1 per cent in early morning trade. In an auction, bidding typically intensifies towards the end of the trading session. A Reuters report said that State Bank of India, the largest public sector bank, could bid in for ONGC shares. Sources told NDTV Profit that LIC has helped the government complete the entire auction process. 

2) This is the biggest equity offering this year. The government could hope to get Rs 12,400 crore if the issue is priced at Rs 295 per share. The auction for 42.77 crore shares started at 09:15 am and ended at 3.30 pm. The floor price was set at Rs 290 per share. The minimum bid quantity was one share (lot size of one share). Citi, JM, Nomura, DSP ML, Morgan Stanley and HSBC Securities are the investment bankers for the deal.

3) The government sold a part of its stake in ONGC to meet its divestment target of Rs 40,000 crore. The government is widely expected to miss its deficit target of 4.6 per cent of GDP for the current fiscal year ending March, partly due to its inability to meet the budget target for more than Rs 40,000 crore in state-company share sales. So far this fiscal year, the government has only raised about Rs 1,250 crore.

4) The government had earlier planned to sell ONGC shares through a public offering but that plan was scrapped last October after tepid response from investors amid weak equity markets. India's stock market posted its first annual fall in three years in 2011, losing nearly 25 percent. Shares in ONGC fell 20 percent in the same period. But the stock market has rebounded in 2012 and the BSE Sensex has climbed nearly 15 percent, with foreign funds scooping up beaten shares worth more than $7 billion.

5) There was no scope for retail investors to participate. That is because there was  no discounts and reservation for retail investors. Normally, 35 per cent of the shares in a public offer are reserved for small investors. "The only disappointment would be on the retail side because retail investors would not be able to participate... Usually retail investors get a discount but that's not happening," RS Sharma, Former CMD of ONGC told NDTV Profit on Wednesday.

6) Big foreign funds, including sovereign funds from Abu Dhabi and Kuwait, had assured the government that they would buy the 5% stake, according to reports. Funds from Singapore and London reportedly also informally underwrote the stake sale. Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) was also expected to bid in today's auction, according to the market buzz.

7) This is the first stake sale being done via auction route. Only last month, the Securities & Exchange Board of India (Sebi) allowed shareholders of the country's top 100 companies by market value to raise funds by auctioning their stakes through stock exchanges. Bankers said while investors would be able to participate in the auction in the same way as in the previously used follow-on share offering, the owner of a company would save significant cost and time in the auctioning process.

8) How does the auction work: Multiple orders from a single buyer shall be permitted. The indicative price & cumulative bid quantity shall be made available on exchanges at regular intervals. Allocation will be intimated to the bidding broker on T+1 basis.  Stock exchanges will collect 100% of the order value in cash. No single bidder other than MFs & insurance companies will be given more than 25 per cent shares.

9) Valuation:  Rs 290 was a very good price. The stock was valued at Rs 330 on 2013 earnings per share (EPS), which is 9-times FY 13 price earnings, Sanjiv Prasad, Executive Director and Co-Head of Kotak Institutional Equities told NDTV Profit yesterday.  The multiples can be re-rated to 10-11- times given the optimistic outlook in the markets, he added. However, the market has not accepted this argument. 

10) A successful auction in ONGC shares will pave the way for divestment in other public sector companies like heavy engineering goods firm BHEL and steel major SAIL.

(With inputs from Reuters)

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10 big facts on ONGC share auction

New Delhi: 

ONGC shares dipped 1.2% as bids for over 97 lakh shares were received up to 2.30 pm on Thursday. This accounts for about 2 per cent of the total planned sale of 42.77 crore shares. The bidding has picked up a bit after a slow start for the first two hours when bids for only over 35,000 shares were received. The government is offering to sell 5 per cent of its stake (42.77 crore shares) in the state-run oil explorer. The auction for the shares, which takes place today, will help the government raise over Rs 12,000 crore. The sale of ONGC shares is part of the government's divestment programme.  

Here are 10 facts on the ONGC auction:

1) As of 2.30 pm, bids were received for 97,03,894 shares. The company's share price dipped 1.2  per cent after gaining 1 per cent in early morning trade. Institutional investors are likely to bid later and try to keep their bidding prices under wraps. In an auction, bidding typically intensifies towards the end of the trading session. A Reuters report said that State Bank of India, the largest public sector bank, could bid in for ONGC shares. 

2) This is the biggest equity offering this year. The government's holding will come down to 69.14% from 74.14% currently post the share sale. The auction for 42.77 crore shares will start at 09:15 am and end at 3.30 pm. The floor price has been set at Rs 290 per share. The minimum bid quantity is one share (lot size of one share). Citi, JM, Nomura, DSP ML, Morgan Stanley and HSBC Securities are the investment bankers for the deal.

3) The government is selling part of its stake in ONGC to meet its divestment target of Rs 40,000 crore. The government is widely expected to miss its deficit target of 4.6 per cent of GDP for the current fiscal year ending March, partly due to its inability to meet the budget target for more than Rs 40,000 crore in state-company share sales. So far this fiscal year, the government has only raised about Rs 1,250 crore.

4) The government had earlier planned to sell ONGC shares through a public offering but that plan was scrapped last October after tepid response from investors amid weak equity markets. India's stock market posted its first annual fall in three years in 2011, losing nearly 25 percent. Shares in ONGC fell 20 percent in the same period. But the stock market has rebounded in 2012 and the BSE Sensex has climbed nearly 15 percent, with foreign funds scooping up beaten shares worth more than $7 billion.

5) Retail investors can participate but market participants say they will not be able to compete with big fund houses and institutions. That is because there will be no discounts and reservation for retail investors. Normally, 35 per cent of the shares in a public offer are reserved for small investors. "The only disappointment would be on the retail side because retail investors would not be able to participate... Usually retail investors get a discount but that's not happening," RS Sharma, Former CMD of ONGC told NDTV Profit on Wednesday.

6) So, who will buy: Big foreign funds, including sovereign funds from Abu Dhabi and Kuwait, have assured the government that they will buy the 5% stake, according to reports. Funds from Singapore and London have reportedly also informally underwritten the stake sale. Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) is also expected to bid in today's auction, according to the market buzz.

7) This is the first stake sale being done via auction route. Only last month, the Securities & Exchange Board of India (Sebi) allowed shareholders of the country's top 100 companies by market value to raise funds by auctioning their stakes through stock exchanges. Bankers said while investors would be able to participate in the auction in the same way as in the previously used follow-on share offering, the owner of a company would save significant cost and time in the auctioning process.

8) How does the auction work: Multiple orders from a single buyer shall be permitted. The indicative price & cumulative bid quantity shall be made available on exchanges at regular intervals. Allocation will be intimated to the bidding broker on T+1 basis.  Stock exchanges will collect 100% of the order value in cash. No single bidder other than MFs & insurance companies will be given more than 25 per cent shares.

9) Valuation:  Rs 290 is a very good price. The stock is valued at Rs 330 on 2013 earnings per share (EPS), which is 9-times FY 13 price earnings, Sanjiv Prasad, Executive Director and Co-Head of Kotak Institutional Equities told NDTV Profit yesterday.  The multiples can be re-rated to 10-11- times given the optimistic outlook in the markets, he added.

10) A successful auction in ONGC shares will pave the way for divestment in other public sector companies like heavy engineering goods firm BHEL and steel major SAIL.

(With inputs from Reuters)

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