State Bank of India (SBI) is pulling out all the stops to improve recoveries from written-off accounts as it seeks to boost profit and reduce provisions.

In the September quarter, India’s largest lender was able to recover Rs.627 crore from written off accounts through its stressed asset management group, up nearly 35% from the Rs.466 crore it recovered from such accounts a year ago.

Mumbai: State-run companies NTPC Ltd and GAIL (India) Ltd are at loggerheads with the former refusing to buy natural gas from the latter, even though the two have a long-term supply contract in place.

Based on the existing contract, NTPC is supposed to buy around 2 million metric standard cubic metres per day (mmscmd) of liquified natural gas (LNG) from GAIL. For the current year, the contract price for this gas was fixed at close to $11-12 per million metric British thermal units (mmBtu). However, NPTC has failed to pick up any of this contracted gas so far this year, leaving GAIL, which sources the gas from a third party, in a spot.

Mumbai: L&T Technology Services Ltd, a unit of India’s largest engineering and construction company Larsen and Toubro Ltd (L&T), is looking at buying start-ups valued $50 million or less, chief executive officer Keshub Panda said, as the company prepares for an initial share sale.

L&T Technology is also focusing on the Internet of Things (IoT), and cloud and automation technologies, Panda said in an interview.

In a feature, it hopes will be a key selling point, YouTube Music will create non-stop stations tailored to users, who can fine-tune how much variety they want.

Users can use the app like a standard music service, searching for artists and playing individual songs or albums. It has licensed the same pool of roughly 30 million audio tracks, users would find on its competitors.

India’s largest software services firm Tata Consultancy Services today said it has partnered British Council to train 1,000 university graduates in the UK at its Innovation Labs and software development centres.

The announcement comes during the UK visit of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Maruti Suzuki Baleno has got off to a flying start with over 21,000 bookings within 15 days of its launch, confirms the Indo-Japanese carmaker. Launched on 26th October 2015, the company sold a total of 4,229 units in just 5 days of its launch. Its rival Honda Jazz, the second best-selling premium hatchback as of now, could manage to maintain a lead of mere 267 units in October despite being on sale for the entire month. Honda sold 4,496 units of the Jazz in the festive month.

The rupee appreciated by 11 paise to 66.20 against the US dollar in early trade on Friday on increased selling of the American currency by exporters.

Besides, weakness in dollar against other currencies overseas ahead of the US retail data supported the domestic unit, forex dealers said.

The benchmark BSE Sensex fell by over 228 points and the NSE Nifty dipped below the crucial 7,800 mark in early trade on Friday as investors offloaded their positions on disappointing macro data and weak trend in Asian markets.

At 1015 hours was trading down 226.47 points, or 0.88% at 25,640.48.

Lebanon observed a national day of mourning on Friday after two suicide bombs on Thursday killed 43 people in southern Beirut, in an act the United Nations condemned overnight as "despicable".

Local television dedicated morning bulletins to the attacks, which were carried out late on Thursday in a busy residential and commercial area that is a stronghold for Lebanese Shi'ite movement Hezbollah, and were claimed by Islamic State.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has expressed concern over a sharp decline in the number of Indian students coming to study in the UK and problems faced by them while applying for visas during his talks with British counterpart David Cameron.

"The Prime Minister raised the issue [of student visas] very strongly. The Prime Minister said that Indian student numbers in the UK has fallen by 50% in the last three years," a Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson said.

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