Agri Min proposes hike in tur dal import duty to 20%
NEW DELHI: Ahead of summer sowing, the Agriculture Ministry has proposed further hike in the import duty of tur dal (pigeon pea) from 10 per cent to 20 per cent in a bid to curb overseas purchase, arrest steep fall in wholesale prices and keep farmers' morale high.
"The current import duty is not having any impact on the domestic rates, which are continuing to rule below the MSP. We have written to the finance ministry to raise the duty to at least 20 per cent to restrict shipments," a senior government official said.
Sending right price signal to farmers is important ahead of the 2017-18 summer (kharif) planting season to begin from July, as it would boost their morale and keep them motivated to grow pulses, which are mostly grown with rainfed conditions in marginal to submarginal lands, the official said.
On March 28, the import duty was slapped on tur dal as its wholesale price had slipped below the minimum support price (MSP) of Rs 5,050 per quintal fixed for this crop year 2016-17 ending next month.
Prices are still under pressure in view of a bumper crop of about 4.23 million tonnes been harvested this year as against 2.56 million tonnes in 2015-16. The ministry is concerned that the trend of falling prices would affect the farmers' sentiments towards the tur planting during the 2017-18 kharif (summer) season even as it has planned a detailed strategy to further scale up the output to a new record.
India is the world's largest pulses producer. Tur dal contributes 15 per cent of the total 22 million tonnes of pulses output. MUMBAI: The sectoral watchdog Irdai has issued new guidelines on outsourcing activities by insurers by clearly defining the areas of work that should be done inhouse and those which can be handed out to third-parties.
The regulator said the regulations dated April 20 but put on the Gazettee of India on May 5, is aimed at ensuring that insurers follow prudent practises on management of risks arising out of outsourcing so as to prevent negative systemic impact on one hand and to protect the interests of the policyholders on the other.
The move is also to ensure sound and responsive management practises for effective oversight and adequate due diligence while outsourcing activities by insurers, it added.
Accordingly, the new regulations ban insurers from outsourcing investments and related functions to third parties, apart from not allowing fund management, including NAV calculations; compliance with AML and product design. NEW DELHI: Mutual fund managers net purchased stocks worth close to Rs 10,000 crore in April, making it the highest investment in five months, on sustained participation by retail investors. This comes on the top of over Rs 51,000 crore investment in stocks in the entire 2016-17 financial year.
Fund houses are upbeat over the industry's performance in the ongoing fiscal while expecting investment from new investors to fuel the growth of the sector.
As per data released by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi), mutual fund managers invested a net sum of Rs 9,918 crore in stock markets last month, much higher than the Rs 4,191 crore infused in March. This was the highest infusion by fund managers since November 2016, when they had invested a net sum of Rs 13,775 crore in stock markets. Apart from equities, fund managers invested a staggering Rs 58,000 crore in debt markets in April.
According to market experts, the mutual fund industry is at a take-off stage in terms of growth and Indian investors are warming up to investments in equity as an asset class.
"The positive net inflow in equities can be credited to maturity of retail investors," Bajaj Capital Chief Executive Rahul Parikh said. "Indian investors have now eventually assimilated mutual funds and the credit goes to awareness programs and endeavours by regulators and Asset Management Companies (AMCS)," he added.
Kaustubh Belapurkar, Director Fund Research at Morningstar, said that flows into equity and balanced funds have been phenomenal since the market correction post demonetisation in November 2016.
"Fund managers over the last few months are effectively deploying these fresh inflows and also looking to reduce their cash levels by investing greater amounts into the equity markets," he added.
A mutual fund pools the assets of its investors and invests the money on their behalf. It provides diverse investment instruments like stocks and bonds without requiring investors to make separate purchases and trades.