
Tatas, Essar get Centre's nod for iron ore acquisition
Domestic steel giants Tatas and Essar have received the Centre's nod to prospect more than 250 million tonnes of iron ore in Bailadila mines in Chhattisgarh for their proposed steel projects with a total capacity of eight million tonnes.
"The Centre has accorded its approval to allow us to prospect Bailadila-III deposit in Chhattisgarh. We are awaiting forest clearance from the government and will commence work only after receiving it," Essar Steel Holdings CEO J Mehra told PTI.
Prospecting would be done on more than 2,000 acres of land and it is expected that the deposit has about 150 million tonnes of iron ore. "We will complete prospecting within six months after we began the work," he said.
Essar Steel had signed an MoU with the Chhattisgarh government to set up a 3.2 million integrated steel plant at an estimated cost of Rs 7,000 crore, Mehra said.
The licence given to Essar was earlier held by National Mineral Development Corporation, but the state-run reportedly lost this in February last as it had not excavated the mines.
Similarly, Tata Steel has also received the government's nod for prospecting the Bailadila-I deposit that has an estimated reserve of up to 150 million tonnes. A Tata Steel spokesman confirmed the development and said prospecting would begin in due course of time.
Tata Steel plans to build a 5 million tonnes steel plant at Bastar in Chhattisgarh at an estimated investment of about Rs 10,000 crore.

Infy, Accenture to cover jab cost for Indian staff
- India’s vaccination campaign ramped up on Monday, with people above the age of 60, and individuals 45 or older suffering from certain medical conditions, now eligible for shots.

Google looks to test interest-based user tracking
- The company, which relies heavily on digital advertising using user data, said it will not track individual-level data such as personally identifiable information (PII) graphs based on people’s email addresses.

Services expand at fastest rate in a year in Feb
- In comparison, PMI for the manufacturing sector had fallen marginally to 57.5 in February from 57.7 a month ago, data released on Monday showed.

GST Council to fix inverted duty anomaly soon
- The Council is expected to meet this month, but a date is yet to be finalized, the first person said.

Jet owner must apply for fresh airport slots, say authorities
- Lawyers representing the consortium had earlier insisted that DGCA and the aviation ministry must follow the principle of historicity and grant slots to the revived Jet Airways.

Maruti targets record production
- The Suzuki Motor Corp. unit has told its suppliers about its strategies, asking them to ramp up production, the people cited above said on condition of anonymity.

Stocks soar over 2% on global rally amid growing optimism
- The BSE Sensex gained 1,147.76 points or 2.28% to end at 51,444.65, while the Nifty surged 326.50 points or 2.19% to close at 15,245.60

Salaried class shrank in FY20
- For those filing returns for FY20 in form ITR-1—people with income from salaries, one house property and farm income up to ₹5,000—the last date for filing was January 10, 2021.

Bank of America says US economy is hurt by a lack of workforce diversity

HDFC reduces interest rates on home loans
- HDFC also outlined that the changes will affect customers who currently have availed home loan benefits from the lender.

Pulkit Vij of Kamal Associates carries forward father’s ‘budget housing' dream

Bitcoin jumps above $50,000 in recovery from last week’s rout

GST body could correct inverted duty on textile, fertiliser, footwear in March

Amazon, Google among those vying for India’s digital payments market
