After India's show on ease of doing business, Sensex hits record high, Nifty touches 10,400

Key indices kicked off Wednesday's early trade with record highs after India's performance on World Bank's 'ease of doing business' list. The country has risen from 130th to 100th this year, helped by a slew of reforms in taxation, licensing, investor protection and bankruptcy resolution.

The 30-share BSE Sensex was up 209.28 points or 0.63 percent at 33,422.41 and the 50-share NSE Nifty rose 61.20 points or 0.59 percent to 10,396.50.

The rally was also backed by banks, metals and telecom stocks.

SBI, Bharti Airtel, Axis Bank, Yes Bank, Vedanta, Tata Steel and JSW Steel were among the top gainers.

India has jumped 30 places to 100th rank in the World Bank's 'ease of doing business' ranking, helped by a slew of reforms in taxation, licensing, investor protection and bankruptcy resolution. This is a major shot in the arm for the government which is fighting a battle of perception with the opposition attacking it over, what it calls the faulty implementation of demonetization and GST.

The World Bank praised India and the work done in last two and three years but acknowledged that more still needs to be done.

Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley made the announcement in an official press conference. Implementation of GST was not incorporated while compiling the report, according to the World Bank.

Jaitley also said India is the only major economy, which the World Bank has hailed for making structural changes. This is the highest jump of rank for any country in this year's report. In 6 out of 10 indicators, India has improved its ranking. In 3 parameters, India has improved in 9 out of 10 indicators. In 3 indicators, India is in the top 30.

Tax compliance has been a big focus of the Modi government and it has been recognised by the World Bank.

Meanwhile, Bharti Airtel's resuts were also out on Tuesday.The country's largest telecom player, has posted 76.5% decline in its consolidated net profit at Rs 343 crore for the quarter ended September this year, after disruptive pricing unleashed by new player Reliance Jio.

For the same quarter last fiscal, the net profit stood at Rs 1,461 crore. The revenues declined 11.7% to Rs 21,777 crore during July-September quarter from Rs 24,651.50 crore in the year-ago period.

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