Cutting short two months of decline, telecom subscriber base rose by 1.98% to 1074.24 million in the country at September-end mainly boosted by the formal launch of services by newcomer Reliance Jio. "The number of telephone subscribers in India increased from 1,053.40 million at the end of August 2016 to 1,074.24 million at the end of September 2016, thereby showing a monthly growth rate of 1.98%," the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India said on Friday.

It was largely known that the State Bank of India (SBI) was selling some stake in its life insurance subsidiary. But, the deal for sale of 3.9% stake in this business for Rs 1,794 crore, announced Friday after market hours, has surprised many.This deal values SBI Life Insurance Company (SBI Life) at Rs 46,000 crore, making it the most valued private life insurance firm, pending the HDFC Life-Max Life merger. The latest valuation is also much ahead of analysts’ recently revised valuation estimates ranging Rs 32,000 to Rs 39,000 crore.

Feeling the heat from Jio’s unlimited free calls and to match up to the incumbent rivals, the second largest telco Vodafone today announced unlimited free voice calls for its prepaid customers with the launch of two new packs. Yesterday, the market leader Airtel and the No 3 player Idea Cellular had launched many schemes to counter Jio’s tariff with free voice calls to prepaid customers and additional data.

Both the companies had launched two identical schemes offering free calls and limited mobile Internet use priced at around Rs 150 and Rs 350 with 28 days validity, in their attempt to match the free 4G service from Reliance Jio.

Defending the ban on high-currency notes, the government on Friday told the Supreme Court that it is not sitting around doing nothing and all the problems will be over in another 10-15 days.

The government was responding to the apex courts question on why the former had not been able to give Rs 24,000 to every customer per week. Should there be a minimum amount the bank should give to customer? it asked.

The country's largest car-maker Maruti Suzuki India on Friday joined hands with taxi aggregator Ola to train aspiring drivers-partners.

Under a Memorandum of Understanding signed between the two, the exercise aims to benefit 40,000 individuals/Ola drivers-partners in safe driving over a period of three years, Maruti Suzuki India (MSI) said in a statement.

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.

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