To encourage widespread usage of digital payments post demonetisation, the government on Wednesday said no transaction charges will be levied on debit cards till December 31.

All public sector banks and some private sector ones have agreed to waive the transaction cost for all payments made through debit cards, Economic Affairs Secretary Shaktikanta Das said.

New Delhi: Even after nearly two months of free services, Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd has not been able to impact the net subscriber additions for incumbent telecom operators.

In fact, the net additions in October for Bharti Airtel Ltd, Idea Cellular Ltd and Vodafone India have been higher than their last six-month average, according to a report by Citi Research.

In a major relief to Anil Ambani-led Reliance Communications, the Supreme Court on Tuesday dismissed the income tax department’s appeal seeking to tax the proceeds of its $1.5-billion foreign currency convertible bonds (FCCBs) issued by the telecom firm nearly a decade ago.

While the company said the apex court has quashed a “contingent tax liability of RCom for about R4,800 crore”, the I-T department in its appeal had claimed a tax liability of R2,236.01 crore for assessment year 2007-08.

Suzuki is working on the new version of the Swift hatchback and the Swift Sport has now been recently spied testing in Europe. The new Suzuki Swift Sport is expected to make its debut at the 2017 Geneva Motor Show in March, along with the new standard Swift model. The 2017 Swift is likely to be launched in India late next year.The Suzuki Swift Sport will be based on the Baleno‘s platform, which reduces the overall weight of the vehicle and improves rigidity and performance. As the name suggests, the new Suzuki Swift Sport will have a sporty body design and will feature a rear spoiler, dual exhaust pipes, new sporty alloy wheels and a lower ride height than the standard Swift.

Faced with economic challenges, engineering major Larsen & Toubro (L&T) has laid off 14,000 employees across businesses during April-September period this year, saying it was necessary to stay "agile and competitive".

"It was a strategic decision that if a business is not in good shape, we are trying to resize it. If there is time to get the business back to normalcy, it is important to reduce the under-recoveries. So, the jobs that we are finding redundant, we are allowing people to move on," company's Chief Financial Officer R Shankar Raman said.

With State Bank of India (SBI), the country’s largest lender, and HDFC Bank, the second-largest private sector lender, deciding to accept payments made through the Unified Payments Interface (UPI), the digital payment system is likely to see robust growth in the days to come. With this, the number of banks accepting UPI payments stands at 28.

Launched on August 25 this year, UPI has made money transfer simpler by doing away with details such as bank account number, IFSC code, etc. Bankers had hailed it as the ‘WhatsApp moment’ for payments in India.

NEW DELHI: With an aim to deepen capital markets, regulator Sebi may consider allowing FPIs to invest in unlisted non-convertible debentures and securitised debt instruments in its board meeting tomorrow.

In a slew of proposed reform measures, the regulator also plans to tighten corporate governance rules on profit-sharing agreements between promoters and private equity funds as part of its efforts to safeguard minority shareholders in markets.

Mumbai: Indian shares on Tuesday bounced back from six-month lows hit in the previous session, led by IT and auto stocks, with sentiment turning positive as Asian shares rallied after all three major US stock indexes hit record highs.

Asian shares were also lifted as crude prices touched their highest for the month after comments from Russian President Vladimir Putin raised the odds of a freeze in oil production. The benchmark BSE Sensex was headed for its first gain in seven sessions, while the broader NSE Nifty was headed for its first winning session in four.

New Delhi: The government will announce more measures to ease the cash crunch in the rural areas, finance minister Arun Jaitley said on Tuesday, even as he stressed that partial demonetisation will benefit the Indian economy in the long term.

He was speaking at the parliamentary party meeting of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Mumbai: The Indian rupee on Tuesday weakened marginally against the US dollar, after local equity markets wiped out most of the gains.

At 2pm, the rupee was trading at 68.23 a dollar, down 0.08% from its previous close of 68.17. The home currency opened at 68.11 against the US dollar and touched a low of 68.27 a dollar—a level last seen on 1 March. So far this year, it fell 2%.

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