Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu today pitched for rail connectivity with neighbouring countries to boost trade and eliminate poverty in the region. Highlighting the need for physical connectivity with neighbours for trade growth, he advocated work on rail link from Kathmandu to Delhi and Kolkata shortly.”Asia is going to be the next future growth centre of the world. Asia being the large continent, it is going to be very interesting to see how all countries of the region participate in the growth,” Prabhu said while inaugurating the global conference on transcontinental rail connectivity here.

Idea Cellular is going all out to take on Reliance Jio and its data offers. Idea has associated with itel, a smartphone brand, to give Indian users 1GB of free data every month for six months. The offer is valid on specific variants of smartphones by itel only. The deal is valid from today and is currently available on the following models under Wish series: it1409, it1407, it1508, it1508+ and Power Pro series it1516+.

Motorola today launched the fifth generation of its best-selling Moto G series – Moto G5 Plus – in the Indian market at a price of Rs 14,999 onwards. Motorola will make available two versions – 3GB RAM/16GB memory and 4GB RAM/32GB memory – for Rs 14,999 and Rs 16,999 respectively. These will go on sale from tonight on Flipkart. Equipped with a full metal design, faster processor and better camera functionality, the Moto G5 will compete with handsets from Xiaomi, Micromax as well as those from the stable of its parent – Lenovo.

MUMBAI: The chief of India's largest bank State Bank of India once again spoke out against farm loan waiver amid talk that the ruling BJP government may soon deliver on its poll promise made in the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections.

SBI Chairman Arundhati Bhattacharya today said that farm loan waivers potentially disturbed credit discipline and raised hope of multiple future waivers.

NEW DELHI: Power equipment maker Bhel today commenced commercial operations of its first 800 MW unit, supercritical thermal plant.

It also marks Bhel's foray as a developer into the field of power generation. Karnataka Power Corporation Ltd (KPCL) and Bhel are the main equity partners of RPCL, the owner and operator of this power plant.

MUMBAI: Reliance Industries counter saw a block deal of about 39 crore shares or 12% of the company equity changing hand on Wednesday morning.

Though the details of the buyers and sellers were not known, market participants said that the block deals were the inter-se transfer of equity holding among promoter group entities.

GUWAHATI: State-owned oil major ONGC has said the preliminary discussion for its acquisition of India's third-biggest fuel retailer HPCL has started and is going on at the ministerial level.

"The talks are going on at ministerial level. We have not discussed it at the ONGC board. The petroleum ministry wants this to happen because if integration takes place, there will be value creation," ONGC Director (onshore) Ved Prakash Mahawar told PTI here.

Days after a group of the Congress' Goa legislators blamed the central leadership for failure to form the government in the state, despite being the single largest party after the Assembly polls, party MLA Vishwajit Rane on Wednesday said that he, along with five to six other MLAs, would quit the party if vice-president Rahul Gandhi does not respond adequately to a letter written to him by them.

The Sensex struck a positive note on Wednesday in the beginning on continued foreign inflows ahead of the expected hike in US interest rates. However, caution prevailed after retail inflation rose to 4-month high of 3.65% in February and that of wholesale prices shot up to a 39-month high of 6.55%.

The Sensex had soared 540.69 points in the previous three sessions following the BJP's landslide win in UP and Uttarakhand. The 30-share index was trading higher by 26.22 points, or 0.08%, at 29,468.85.

Tata Motors will offer voluntary retirement scheme to trim costs as part of restructuring although the number of employees is still being worked out.

"Tata Motors confirms that as part of the on-going organisation effectiveness project, where we have already finalised the top two levels (L1-L2) of our management structure, a proposal on VRS package has been presented and approved by the board," a Tata Motors Spokesperson said in an emailed statement.

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