India; second highest Internet users market in Asia by 2005
New Delhi-- Despite the fact that India is grouped with the low telephone penetration countries, India is poised to record the highest Internet access spending growth rate of 49.7 per cent between 2001-2005. This is according to latest findings of management consultants PricewaterhouseCoopers.

PwC says that India will have 25 million users in 2005, up from a mere three million in 2000 with the highest annual growth being in 2001 at 93 per cent. This growth would gradually taper off to 60.6 per cent in 2002, 48.6 per cent in 2003, 32.1 per cent in 2004 and 23.8 per cent in 2005.
However Indians will be next to China among low telephone penetration countries, in terms of the actual spend and if the Chinese are expected to be spend $3,744 million in 2005, Indians will spend $ 1,545 million in the same year. China in fact will become the largest Internet market in Asia Pacific.
The region would be the second largest in the World after the US.
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Slower growth for India says IMF
Washington—The International Monetary Fund said that India’s economic growth would slow down to 5.6 per cent in 2001 from 6 per cent in the previous year.

The fund says that India should promote private investment and contain deficit, which consume half the domestic saving, to remove the growth impediments.
At the same time the fund praised India in the face of worldwide slowdown saying it, along with China, would give the much-needed ‘stability’ to the global economy.
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Bima Nivesh in present form may be closed down
Mumbai—There is a possibility that the Bima Nivesh policy of the Life Insurance Corporation of India may be closed down on June 30 in its present form.
This decision was taken by the management as it found the present assured returns of 9.5 per cent for a five-year policy and 10.5 per cent for a 10-year policy are unsustainable in a declining interest rate scenario.

A senior official denying this said, "When terms and conditions are changed, approval from the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA) is required."
LIC is currently waiting for approval from the regulatory body and the board before revising the present returns on Bima Nivesh downward.

There has been a massive response to Bima Nivesh in the current fiscal, with LIC having sold 1.9 lakh Bima Nivesh policies in the first two-and-a-half months of the current year, netting a sum of Rs 1,153.45 crore.
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Hike in monthly cable bill soon
Mumbai/New Delhi—Cable charges are set to be hiked by Rs 50 to Rs 100 very soon.
The reason being that popular television channels – Star, Zee and Sony – are now pay channels. The cable payout to these channels over the last six months has gone up to the tune of around Rs 130 per month per subscriber from Rs 60 earlier.
Most subscribers complain that they are forced to pay for a number of channels that they do not watch. A typical subscriber at a time gets about 60 channels to watch of which he may watch only five to six on a regular basis.

A way out could be putting in place cable addressable systems. Cable addressable systems allow a cable operator to monitor what channels are being watched and switch on or off any channel the viewer does not want.
This happens through a small device kept at viewer's premise. But addressability comes at a cost, which should be shared between broadcaster, cable operator and viewer.
Many in the industry believe that before addressability comes in it is important to put in place a regulatory mechanism. Till that time the viewer has to take the bundle on offer - it's a take-it or leave-it situation.
Subscription rates in India, the third largest cable market in the world (35 million households) - after China (90 million) and United States (65 million) - are one of the lowest in the world.
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The world’s first 3G wireless network may be launched in India
Bangalore-- According to a top official of Nortel Networks, the next generation 3G wireless networks could roll out from the fledgling Indian wireless market, mainly a GSM pocket borough so far.
Jean-Luc Jezouin, vice president (mobility), Asia, Nortel Networks said that while GSM networks had already evolved in India and was developing into GPRS, there was a good chance that there would be some 1XRTT networks in India by the end of this year. Essentially, all 3G networks are CDMA-based and offer higher bandwidth of up to 2mbps to users.
There will be some 1XRTT networks in India by the end of the year. So India will surprisingly be one of the very first 3G countries in the world he said.
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Inland waterways soon to be open for private parties
New Delhi--The Inland Waterways Authority of India (IWAI) is to shortly make the first offer of 10 bankable projects for private partnerships on the three national waterways. These would include construction of terminals on build-own-transfer (BOT) basis and other infrastructure works.
Senior IWAI officials say that out of the 10 projects, four are on the 1,620-km national waterways (NW) number 1, which covers the Ganges from Allahabad to Haldia.
Three projects are each on 891-km NW 2 on the Brahmaputra from Dhubri-Sadiya and 205-km NW 3 on the West Coast canal (along with Champakara and Udyogmandal canals).
Profiles for the projects, which have been identified on the basis of a study conducted by the National Council for Applied Economic Research (NCAER), will be finalised shortly.
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