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Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday accused Russia, which has launched an invasion of his country, of seeking to "erase" Ukrainians, their country and their history.

In a video address, the Ukrainian leader said a missile strike on a target at the site of a Holocaust massacre shows that "for many people in Russia our Kyiv is completely foreign.

Since the fight between Ashneer Grover and BharatPe’s board began two months back, the company for the first officially accused the embattled founder's family and relative of misappropriating funds on Wednesday.

“The Grover family and their relatives engaged in extensive misappropriation of company funds, including, but not limited to, creating fake vendors through which they siphoned money away from the company’s account and grossly abused company expense accounts in order to enrich themselves and fund their lavish lifestyles,” said BharatPe.

“The company reserves all rights to take further legal action against him and his family. The Board will not allow the deplorable conduct of the Grover family to tarnish BharatPe’s reputation or that of its hard-working employees and world-class technology. As a result of his misdeeds, Mr. Grover is no longer an employee, a founder, or a director of the company,” it added.

The company also said that the Board is taking all necessary steps to further strengthen the company’s corporate governance, including the appointment of an audit committee, an internal auditor, and the implementation of other key internal controls.

"I am appalled at the personal nature of the company’s statement, but not surprised. It comes from a position of personal hatred and low thinking. I think the Board needs to be reminded of $1 million of secondary shares investors bought from me in Series C, $2.5 million in Series D and $8.5 million in Series E," said Ashneer Grover in response to BhatatPe allegations today.

"I would also want to learn who among Amarchand, PWC and A&M has started doing audit on ‘lavishness’ of one’s lifestyle ? The only thing lavish about me is my dreams and ability to achieve them against all odds through hard work and enterprise. I hope the Board can get back to working soon - I as a shareholder am worried about the value destruction. I wish the Company and the Board a speedy recovery," he added.

Business Standard reported earlier that the fintech unicorn is looking to hire a chief financial officer, an internal audit head and stren­gthen its procurement processes in the next one month, according to sources close to developments.

Grover resigned as managing director (MD) and company’s board director on Monday. The company later said Grover’s resignation letter was received within minutes after a board meeting was called to deliberate on an audit report by accounting firm PwC.

Although the board meeting happened on Tuesday night, the company has not disclosed what decisions were taken – and whether an FIR will be filed based on the audit report.

"The Board of BharatPe noted the termination of employment of Ashneer Grover as a consequence of his resignation from the post of MD as well as Director. However, as he resigned without the approval of the board and majority investors, consequences under the Shareholder agreement have now been triggered," said a source close to the developments.

Grover currently has around 9 per cent shareholding in the company. The board meeting, which started late Tuesday evening (as some directors are in the US), was expected to touch upon the possibility of clawing back his shares in accordance with the articles of association and shareholding agreement.

A source close to the development said Grover currently has 9.5 per cent shareholding in the company. However, the board meeting, which started late Tuesday evening (as some directors are in the US), was expected to touch upon the possibility of clawing back his shares in accordance with the articles of association and shareholding agreement.

“They can’t do anything with the shares since the shareholder agreement (SHA) does not allow them at all (to claw back shares),” Grover earlier told Business Standard earlier this week.

Grover’s resignation came days after a plea filed by him with the Singapore International Arbitration Centre was dismissed. In his petition, the BharatPe co-founder had sought indemnity from the audit report and asked to render it invalid as it did not comply with the SHA.

Also Read Investor-founder relation in India is one of master-slave: Ashneer Grover

Manufacturing is one of the principal growth engines that helps a country chug along the economic development track. To boost domestic manufacturing and cut down on import bills, the Centre, in March 2020, had introduced a production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme that aims to give companies - domestic and foreign - incentives on incremental sale of products manufactured locally. In almost two years now, 13 sectors have been covered under the scheme. Uncannily, the PLI scheme implementation coincided with the outbreak of the Covid-19.  Moneycontrol Pro thought it would be worthwhile to check the progress of the scheme in this pandemic-whacked period. 

Starting today, India Ratings and Research (Ind-Ra)  — a 100 percent Fitch group company — will review the progress of each of the sectors every week on Wednesdays. To begin with, Ind-Ra dissects the PLI scheme for large-scale electronics manufacturing, the first sector that was notified under the programme in April 2020. 

As part of the Digital India drive, the electronics sector has been on the central government’s radar for quite some time now. Several schemes were introduced in the past that aimed to provide a leg-up to the industry by way of grants and subsidies. In spite of all the incentives provided by the government, a sharply rising domestic demand (the digital “boom”) for electronic items far surpassed local production, leading to higher imports. The share of electronics in India’s total import bill rose to 4.2 percent in FY20 from1.8 percent in FY15.

To boost domestic production of mobile phones and specified electronic components and attract investments, the central government had notified the Production-Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme for electronics components in April 2020. Under the scheme, eligible companies are allowed to claim an incentive of 4-6 percent on incremental sales (over the base year of FY21) of manufactured goods for a period of five years. The government has already approved 16 players with a total envisaged investment of Rs 11,000 crore and expects a production value of Rs10.4 lakh crore in the next five years, of which about 60 percent is likely to be exported. The scheme is also likely to enhance the competitiveness of local electronics products.

It is expected that the assembling of mobile parts may become the most attractive activity, as the incentive of 4-6 percent is about 50-100 percent of the total assembly cost of mobile phones. The manufacturing of some of the basic components with low value addition, such as casing, batteries, and audio, may also pick up momentum, while high-end components, such as camera, display, and memory, will take time.

Shortcomings

The PLI scheme still needs to address a few issues. First, to ramp-up local production, the scheme offers incentives only for a fixed period of five years, starting from the base year of FY21. With the raging global supply-chain issues and the pandemic-led demand disruption, mobile phone manufacturers may not be able to achieve the near-term production targets and claim incentives.

Second, the incentives of 4-6 percent is pretty meaningful given that operating profit margins for large mobile phone manufacturers range between 3-7 percent. This may improve the competitiveness of Indian manufacturers substantially over the scheme period. However, the competitiveness of the manufacturing facilities in the absence of the incentives remains to be seen.

Third, the current scheme aims at providing big incentives to large corporate houses in select sectors, who can quickly build the scale. This is a deviation from the earlier schemes (MEIS, RoDTEP), which aimed at providing small incentives to a much wider corporate landscape. In order to provide a complete manufacturing ecosystem, active participation of small-scale players will also be required. It remains to be seen how much of the PLI incentives percolate down to SME/MSME participants.

Finally, issues relating to the availability of skilled manpower and high-latency infrastructure facilities need to be addressed.

Opportunities

In Ind-Ra’s view, the advantage of the PLI scheme should be seen beyond its present stated scope. For instance, committed investments, at present, are predominantly focused on low value-added services such as assembling or manufacturing low-cost components (casings), which form less than 10 percent of a mobile phone’s total Bill-of-Material. In order to achieve the stated target of increasing the gross domestic value addition from the current 15-20percent to 35-40 percent for mobile phones and 45-50 percent for electronic components, a shift to higher value-added products/processes is required. Nevertheless, companies would expect a robust manufacturing ecosystem before committing investments and starting with low value-added activities will provide the adequate boost.

Moreover, India now attracts manufacturing activities for low-cost smartphones or feature phones, which have lower Average Selling Price ASP), and hence, lower likely incentives. A progressive shift towards higher ASP brands or products would improve the stickiness of cash flows in the long term.

Structurally, many global telecom OEMs are focusing more on R&D and marketing activities, while outsourcing low value-added manufacturing activities to their suppliers. These OEMs have preference for a focused set of suppliers with whom they intend to have long-term contracts. A timely execution of orders by Indian corporate houses may open up future business potential.

In summary, the PLI scheme for mobile handsets provides a leg-up to manufacturing by providing meaningfully big incentives to a few large players. It still needs to address a few issues, including structural competitiveness in the absence of PLI incentives, availability of skilled manpower and high-latency infrastructure, benefits to the SME/MSME segment, and near-term supply-chain issues. Nevertheless, the benefit of the PLI scheme should be seen beyond its present stated scope. The progression from low-cost components to high-cost components, or from low-ASP products to high-ASP products can throw up much larger opportunities.

Read Also| February GST collections at Rs 1.33 lakh crore, down 5.6% from January

Goods and Services Tax (GST) collections for February declined to Rs 1.33 lakh crore, down 5.6 percent from the first month of 2022, data released on March 1 by the finance ministry showed.

Of the total, Central GST was Rs 24,435 crore, State GST was Rs 30,779 crore, Integrated GST was Rs 67,471 crore, and compensation cess was Rs 10,340 crore.

Also Read: No adversarial relationship between Centre and states on GST: FM Sitharaman

In February, the government settled Rs 26,347 crore to Central GST and Rs 21,909 crore to State GST from Integrated GST. As such, the total revenue for the month post settlement was Rs 50,782 crore for the Centre and Rs 52,688 crore for State GST.

"February, being a 28-day month, normally witnesses revenues lower than that in January. This high growth during February 2022 should also be seen in the context of partial lockdowns, weekend and night curfews and various restrictions that were put in place by various States due to the omicron wave, which peaked around January 20," the finance ministry said in a statement.

While total GST collections declined sequentially last month, they were up 17.6 percent from February 2021. This is also the eighth month in a row that total GST mop-up has come in above the Rs 1-lakh-crore mark.

The GST compensation cess collected in February is the highest ever, crossing the Rs 10,000-crore mark for the first time. The finance ministry said this indicated a recovery in certain key sectors, such as automobiles.

Also Read| Investor-founder relation in India is one of master-slave: Ashneer Grover

In his resignation letter to the Board, BharatPe co-founder Ashneer Grover has hit out at the investors in his company. In the wee hours of Tuesday, the embattled founder of the fintech unicorn quit as the managing director and one of the directors of the Board.

Shedding light on his fraught relationship with the company’s investors, Grover wrote: "You treat us founders as slaves – pushing us to build multi-billion-dollar businesses and cutting us down at will. Investor-founder relation in India is one of master-slave. I am the rebel slave who must be hung by the tree so none of the other slaves can dare to be like me ever again."

"None of you, including the ones based in India, have ever been to our office even once, since the pandemic turned our lives upside down and sought to suffocate the economy. Not even once. Not Micky. Not Harshjit. Not Mohit. Not Teru San. Not Rahul. Not Deven. No one. None of you even turned-up despite an invitation for the inauguration of our new office," he added.

Grover was referring to Micky Malka of Ribbit Capital, Harshjit Sethi of Sequoia, Teruhide Sato of Beenext, Rahul Vijay Kishore of Coatue, and Deven Parekh of Insight Partners.

Ribbit Capital owns 11 per cent of shareholding in the company, Beenext holds 9.6 per cent, Sequoia 19.6 per cent, Coatue 12.4 per cent, according to data from Tracxn. Insight Partners holds around 10 per cent of the company, according to media reports.

Grover has resigned amid a tussle in the company where Grover has found himself on the opposite side of the Board, key investors in the company and his co-founders.

Meanwhile, the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC) has refused to grant emergency relief to Grover from a governance review being conducted by the company, according to sources.

Earlier this month, he had filed an arbitration plea earlier this month to stop a probe into alleged financial mismanagement in the company. The BharatPe MD, who went on leave last month till March-end, is also said to be seeking indemnity against future action by the company through the plea.

The company and Grover are also reportedly in talks to settle the matter by buying out the latter’s stake in the unicorn. Grover’s stake of 9.5 per cent in the company was worth Rs 1,915 crore based on the last funding round in August, when BharatPe was valued at $2.8 billion.

The prices of 19 kg commercial LPG cylinders have been increased by Rs 105 in Delhi from March 1, news agency ANI reported.

Following the price hike, the 19 kg commercial cylinder will cost Rs 2,012 in the national capital from Tuesday. The price of a 5 kg cylinder has also been increased by Rs 27. Now a 5 kg cylinder will cost Rs 569 in Delhi.

Following the given hike, commercial gas cylinders in Kolkata will now cost Rs 2,089. In Mumbai, commercial gas will now cost Rs 1,962 with the hike of Rs 105. Chennai also saw a hike of Rs 105 with the price of a 19-kg commercial gas cylinder rising to Rs 2,185.5.

On the other hand, there has been no change in domestic LPG cylinder prices. LPG Cylinder rates are revised monthly across all the states and union territories in India

Notably, the National Oil Marketing companies slashed the prices of 19 kg commercial LPG cylinder by Rs 91.50 on February 1, ahead of the Union Budget 2022.

On January 1, oil marketing companies had slashed the price of 19 kg commercial LPG cylinder by Rs 102.50.

On December 1, Commercial cooking gas price was increased by Rs 100, taking the cost of a 19 kg commercial LPG cylinder to Rs 2,101 in Delhi. This was the second-highest price of the commercial cylinder after 2012-13 when it cost around Rs 2,200 per cylinder.

In November, the commercial cooking gas prices were increased by Rs 266.

Price hike in coming months

A sharp rise in cooking gas prices is expected from April 2022, according to various media reports. Reportedly, the prices of compressed natural gas (CNG), Piped Natural Gas (PNG), and even electricity could also rise in the coming months.

Read Also |Madhabi Puri Buch appointed Sebi chairperson for a term of three years

Madhabi Puri Buch has on Monday been appointed as the chairperson for market regulator Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi). The Appointments Committee of Cabinet has approved Buch's appointment for an initial period of three years. Her tenure as a whole-time member of Sebi ended in October 2021.

Puri Buch will be the first woman to head the securities market regulator, which has evolved to become one of the most important institutions in the financial market ecosystem. She is also the first person from the private sector to head Sebi.

Current chairman Ajay Tyagi’s tenure as Sebi chairman ends today. He served as chairman for five years. Puri Buch, who has been granted an initial term of three years, will assume charge on March 1.

Puri Buch has worked closely with Tyagi as she was the WTM between April 05, 2017 and October 04, 2021.

She has handled key portfolios such as surveillance, collective investment schemes and investment management.

An alumna of Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmedabad, Buch has three decades of financial market experience. She joined ICICI Bank in 1989.

At the private lender, Buch worked in corporate finance, branding, treasury and loans, before moving to ICICI Securities. She headed the domestic investment bank before moving abroad, where she headed private equity firm Greater Pacific Capital. She later served as a consultant to the New Development Bank, set up by the BRICS bloc of nations.

Read Also| India skips resolution to call for UN General Assembly session on Ukraine

Article Source:- Business Standard

India abstained from a procedural vote taken in the UN Security Council to call for a rare special emergency session of the UN General Assembly on Russia's aggression against Ukraine.

The resolution was adopted with 11 votes in favour, paving the way for the General Assembly to meet on the crisis as soon as Monday. India, China and the UAE abstained, while Russia voted against the resolution.

The 15-nation Security Council met on Sunday afternoon to hold the vote on the emergency special session of the 193-member General Assembly on Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

This comes two days after the Russian veto blocked a UNSC resolution on its "aggression" against Ukraine.

The vote calling for the UNGA session was procedural so none of the five permanent members of the Security Council -- China, France, Russia, UK and the US -- could exercise their vetoes.

President of the 76th session of the General Assembly Abdulla Shahid, who was to attend the 49th regular session of the Human Rights Council in Geneva, cancelled his trip "due to the ongoing situation in Ukraine and potential developments in the Security Council," for the vote.

He also met with Ukraine's Permanent Representative to the UN Ambassador Sergiy Kyslytsya on Saturday after the veto on the draft resolution in the Security Council. Kyslytsya briefed Shahid "on the security situation in Kyiv and the potential action he would be seeking in the General Assembly."

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres also cancelled his scheduled trip to Geneva for the Human Rights Council meeting "due to the aggravating situation in Ukraine."

On Friday too, India, China and the UAE abstained from the resolution, while 11 members of the Council voted in favour.

The UNSC resolution was expected to be blocked since Russia, a permanent member of the Council and President of the UN organ for the month of February, was certain to use its veto. Western nations said the resolution had sought to show Moscow's isolation on the global stage for its invasion and actions against Ukraine.

US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield had said after the failed UNSC vote that "we will be taking this matter to the General Assembly, where the Russian veto does not apply and the nations of the world will continue to hold Russia accountable."

While a UNSC resolution would have been legally binding, General Assembly resolutions are not. A vote in the 193-member UN body is symbolic of world opinion.

In the explanation of vote in the Security Council on Friday, India's Permanent Representative to the UN Ambassador T S Tirumurti had said India is "deeply disturbed" by the recent turn of developments in Ukraine and urges that all efforts be made for the immediate cessation of violence and hostilities.

Tirumurti also said India is "deeply concerned" about the welfare and security of the Indian community, including a large number of Indian students, in Ukraine.

"Dialogue is the only answer to settling differences and disputes, however daunting that may appear at this moment. It is a matter of regret that the path of diplomacy was given up. We must return to it. For all these reasons, India has chosen to abstain on this resolution," Tirumurti had said.

In March 2014, after Russia's annexation of Crimea, the General Assembly had adopted a resolution that underscored the "invalidity" of the referendum held in "autonomous Crimea".

By a recorded vote of 100 in favour to 11 against, with 58 abstentions, the Assembly had adopted a resolution titled 'Territorial Integrity of Ukraine', calling on States, international organisations and specialised agencies not to recognise any change in the status of Crimea or the Black Sea port city of Sevastopol, and to refrain from actions or dealings that might be interpreted as such. India had abstained from the resolution.

Under the resolution "Uniting for Peace", adopted by the General Assembly in November 1950, an emergency special session can be convened within 24 hours of such a meeting being requested.

The UNGA "resolves that if the Security Council, because of lack of unanimity of the permanent members, fails to exercise its primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security in any case where there appears to be a threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression, the General Assembly shall consider the matter immediately with a view to making appropriate recommendations to Members...," the resolution states.

"If not in session at the time, the General Assembly may meet in emergency special session within twenty-four hours of the request therefore. Such emergency special session shall be called if requested by the Security Council on the vote of any seven members, or by a majority of the Members of the United Nations," it says.

The UNGA resolution of 1950 also reaffirms the "importance of the exercise by the Security Council of its primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security, and the duty of the permanent members to seek unanimity and to exercise restraint in the use of the veto.

Also Read|  Russia-Ukraine crisis further complicates matters for RBI, its MPC

It is clear that governments and central banks, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) included, across the world are looking for an opportune moment to exit from stimulus mode and drain out excess liquidity. In its February monetary policy, the RBI deferred the normalisation of policy rates because the weakness in India’s growth recovery continues and it is outweighed by the worryingly high ‘global inflation’.

A few weeks after the policy, global dynamics have changed with rising geopolitical uncertainties following the Russia-Ukraine conflict war, and the consequent sanctions imposed by the West. The ‘normalisation process’, which was difficult, could get worse, mainly because we are moving further into the conundrum of higher inflation and lower growth (at least globally). The MPC will have to delve on how the exogenous geopolitical risk will impact inflation and growth spillovers in the middle of a gradual exit from the accommodative monetary policy.

Firstly, the Economist points out that Russia’s attack on Ukraine is likely to isolate Russia’s economy. The immediate global implications will be in terms of higher inflation, lower growth, and disruptions in the financial markets via deeper sanctions. However, the good news is that the impact on India’s growth is likely to be limited as Russia is not India’s major trading partner with just 0.8 percent share in India’s export and 1.5 percent of its imports.

What’s worrying is the indirect spillovers of a broader growth slowdown. This is important in the context that the MPC has judged that India’s growth recovery is incomplete, and policy support remains inevitable. The IMF, in January, slashed the global growth forecast for 2022 and 2023 by 50 bps and 70 bps respectively due to Omicron-associated restrictions. If global growth weakness emerges and there is further downward revision, India’s buoyant recovery could take a set-back via the trade channel. Also, if supply bottlenecks emerge, the manufacturing and infrastructure sector could have notable repercussions. Given the MPC’s higher weightage to growth over inflation since March 2020, geopolitical risks could make the MPC remain ‘accommodative’ for a longer time.

On the other hand, near-term inflation will play spoilsport. The ‘oil monster’ has woken up from its slumber, boiling at about $100 per barrel, and is likely to remain range-bound in the immediate future. This increase in the crude barrel will seep into the retail inflation through direct channels such as increase in pump prices and the palpable impact via freight rate hikes, which companies would eventually pass on to the consumer.

This could push wholesale inflation higher for a couple of months, but high base-effect of the previous year is likely to temper the spikes. The headline retail inflation number may not come down to the MPC’s inflation forecast of 4.5 percent for 2022-23. The three-month ahead and one-year ahead inflation expectations, which dipped recently as per RBI’s survey forecasts, could see an immediate upward shift for the shorter time horizon.

Inflation in the next couple of months will be high owing to supply side disruptions. Thus, RBI Deputy Governor Michael Patra’s comments in the minutes are important. He points that inflation led by supply constraints cannot be stabilised by monetary policy instruments. Thus, one can infer that change in the ‘accommodative stance’ and raising policy rates could be further delayed.

The one area where the RBI will have a significant intervention will be in the external sector management. The current account deficit is likely to swell due to rising crude oil imports. In addition, with the expected normalisation of monetary policy and rate hikes by key advanced economies, foreign portfolio outflows could weigh on the balance of payments scenario. Ashima Goyal, emeritus professor at the Indira Gandhi Institute for Development Research, is of the view that interest-sensitive foreign flows are still a small percentage of the Indian market, and, therefore, potential outflows are a miniscule portion of India’s forex reserves (pegged at around $630 billion). With rising imports and likely portfolio outflows as a reaction to geopolitical and monetary policy normalisations, balance of payments and currency management will be more critical than gradual normalisation.

The headwinds from the geopolitical risks coupled with the expected policy normalisation by advanced economies have pushed the RBI’s MPC in a tricky position where there are no easy answers. The added challenges of global growth slowdown spillovers led by global value chains bottlenecks will be an important determinant to look out for. Near-term inflation spikes if led by supply shortages/disruptions is unlikely to shift the policy stance to ‘neutral’ in the coming policy.

When one looks back and compares, it feels like the policy stimulus responses during an unprecedented COVID-19 pandemic were easy to manage. Exiting the stimulus in the thick of geopolitical risks has just made the equation a difficult one to crack.

Also Read| Russian participation at Mobile World Congress 2022 to be restricted