The Supreme Court on Friday began hearing a batch of petitions and public interest litigations (PILs) challenging the demonetization policy of the Central government, which came into effect on the midnight of November 8.

Arguing for the Centre, Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi told the court that the government had taken all the necessary steps to ease inconveniences of the general public.

Government today informed Parliament that a decision has been taken to print plastic currency notes and procurement of material has started.

"It has been decided to print banknotes based on plastic or polymer substrate. The process of procurement has been initiated," Minister of State for Finance Arjun Ram Meghwal said in a written reply in Lok Sabha to a query whether RBI proposes to print plastic currency notes in place of paper ones.

Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi slammed PM Narendra Modi again on Friday calling the demonetization the biggest scam of the country.

"Demonetization is the biggest scam in Indian history. I will expose it in the House but the government is not allowing me to speak," said Gandhi. "Since a month we've been trying debate on demonetisation, we want things to become clear now. ," he said.

A major banking sector union on Thursday asked the RBI to supply adequate cash to nationalised bank branches and ATMs or stop cash transactions, otherwise they may resort to agitation and even go on strike.

The All India Bank Employees' Association (AIBEA) however refuted a news report that the unions would strike work next week.

Mumbai: National Stock Exchange of India Ltd (NSE) will start operations in International Financial Services Centre (IFSC) or the Gujarat International Finance Tec- (GIFT) City in the second half of January, two people directly familiar with the developments said.

“The exchange has received approvals from Registrar of Companies (RoC) to set up NSE IFSC Ltd and NSE IFSC Clearing Corp. Ltd and is in process of applying to Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) for its approval,” the first person said, requesting anonymity.

Volvo India, fully owned by Sweden-based AB Volvo Group, has said that it would end up closing the year, ending December 2016, with about 20% growth over 2015. The growth was primarily driven by construction equipment, which is growing at around 40%.

Speaking to Business Standard on the sidelines of CII's Cost Congress 2016, Kamal Bali, Managing Director, Volvo India said that today Volvo India operations include all its four businesses including construction equipment, trucks, buses, and engines. Besides, it is also an important destination as far as Information Technology is concerned.

A total of 21,678 passengers availed the last minute ticket sale scheme, which was launched by the national carrier Air India in early July this year under which it offered fares equivalent to AC second class of Rajdhani Express, Parliament was informed.

The Government-run airline had on July 9 launched the offer for a limited period, saying that the move was aimed at not only making last-minute bookings more affordable but also to fill up vacant seats.

MUMBAI: The rupee gained 19 paise to 67.44 against the dollar in early trade on Thursday on sustained selling of the US currency by exporters and banks amid a higher opening in the domestic equity market amid foreign fund inflows.

This was the third consecutive day of rise for the domestic currency.

New Delhi: In what could be seen as a strategic pricing cut to counter Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd’s offers, Bharti Airtel on Thursday announced free voice calls across India bundled with 300 MB of 4G data at Rs145. The offer is available for prepaid customers and valid for Airtel-to-Airtel calls.

The lowest tariff plan announced by Reliance Jio costs Rs149, and offers free calls and 300 MB data bundled together.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley will table in Parliament a notification that will exempt credit and debit card transactions up to Rs 2,000 from the levy of service tax.

The move is aimed at promoting electronic transactions following the demonetisation of high value currency notes from the midnight of November 8 onwards.

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