Lok Sabha passes insurance bill
New Delhi: The Lok Sabha passed the insurance bill with support from the Congress, thus ending the impasse for the last six years in the efforts to privatise the insurance sector in the country. The bill will come up in the Rajya Sabha next week.

The passage of the bill also signified the start of the second phase of the reforms. The Communist Party of India (Marxist) made a last-minute effort to have the bill referred to a joint committee of the Parliament but the proposal was rejected by 331 votes to 82. An amendment to the bill moved by finance minister Yashwant Sinha provided for preference in registration to companies offering health insurance. Mr Sinha assured the house that there will be no flight of capital from the country.

The passage of the bill has been welcomed in general by foreign insurance companies now waiting on the wings to enter the insurance sector in the country once it is formally opened up.

The house also gave assent to the Money Laundering (Prevention) bill and the Foreign Exchange Management Act bill. The  bills provide for penalties to offenders and facilitate external trade by removing hurdles in foreign exchange transactions.
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SBI to seek RBI nod for insurance foray
Mumbai: The State Bank of India will be the first to set up an insurance company in India as the sector has now opened up for private participation, the bank's chairman G.G. Vaidya said. The bank will formally seek permission from the Reserve Bank of India to appoint consultants for the insurnace business, he added.

Mr Vaidya said the bank is yet to finalise on a foreign ally.
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Standard Life to hike stake in HDFC
Mumbai: Standard Life Assurance Company of the UK will increase its stake in HDFC by 10 per cent. It already holds five per cent stake in the company. The company, Europe’s largest mutual insurance venture, will, however, have to take the secondary market route for hiking the stake. It also plans to pick up stakes in HDFC Bank and the asset management company being floated by HDFC.
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No lay-off of Times Bank staff
Mumbai: HDFC Bank does not intend to cut off or lay off staff at  Times Bank following the merger of the latter with the former. It has also told the members of staff of Times Bank that salary structure of the junior staff, which is a little higher compared to that in HDFC Bank, will be protected.

Meanwhile, Mandeep Maitra and Rama Sridhar of Times Bank have been nominated to handle human resources-related functions and direct banking functions respectively of the merged entity.
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Banks to share information in defaulters
Calcutta: Banks in Calcutta will circulate among themselves a list of loan defaulters. Under an understanding initiated by the local chapter of the Indian banks Association, 30 commercial banks in the region will disclose non-performing assets between Rs five lakh and Rs 50 lakh. Calcutta becomes the second city after Bangalore to introduce such a system in the banking industry.
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Bank strike on December 17
Calcutta: All India Bank Employees Association, the largest banking sector trade union, has called for a stroke on 17 December over pending wage settlement issues.
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FIs pick up stake in Global Trust
Mumbai: Financial Institutions have picked up stakes in Global Trust Bank. Ramesh Gelli, chairman and managing director of the bank, confirmed this but did not disclose the identity of the institutions. Bank sources said the shares were acquired by members of the promoters’ group who then placed them directly in the market where the financial institutions picked them up.

Two foreign strategic partners of the bank, Hambrecht & Quist of the US and TA Enterprises of Malaysia have recently divested their stake in the bank.
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Poor, developing nations may concede on labour
Seattle: The poor and developing countries, which have put up stiff resistance to issues like labour and environment being made part of trade at the World Trade Organisation meeting, may be forced to evolve a compromise formula by which they will gain better market access and possibly a review of the anti-dumping laws.

According to sources in the Indian delegation, the developing and poor countries are likely to adopt this strategy. The market access provision relates to products of export interest. They feel this stand may gain for the poor and developinjg countries right to increase tariffs beyond the bound levels in respect of specific products.

The developing countries are also likely to allow setting up of a working group on biotechnology, a suggestion made by Canada.

On a larger plane, the European Union and the US appeared to be unanimous on the issue of linking trade with labour and environment under the WTO. Both president Bill Clinton of the US and Pascal Lamy, European trade commissioner, pursued a common goal of including the issue at least in the declaration. They also appeared to be having identical views on including non-governmental organisations in WTO.
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