Banking, Financial and Economic Awareness

Main Headlines:

1. Thermal coal imports decline

In April-June quarter of current fiscal, thermal coal imports have declined 34.70% to 17.71 million tonnes.
Coking coal imports have also declined by 28.49% to 10.69 million tonnes in April-June quarter of current fiscal.
The data is as per the report of Indian Ports’ Association (IPA).
In April-June quarter of previous fiscal, thermal coal imports and coking coal imports stood at 27.13 million tonnes and 14.95 million tonnes, respectively.
Thermal coal is used in power generation and coking coal is used for steel making.
In the list of largest producers of coal, India comes at third place after China and US.

Government has amended schedule VII of Companies Act to include corporate spending towards certain CAPF and CPMF personnel under corporate social responsibility.
As per the amendment, corporate spending towards Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) and CPMF veterans will be included under corporate social responsibility.
This includes corporate spending towards dependents of CAPF and Central Para Military Forces (CPMF) veterans, including their widows.
Before the amendment, only spending towards benefit of armed forces veterans, war widows and their dependents was considered as corporate social responsibility.
Schedule VII of Companies Act, 2013 provides list of activities that companies are allowed to include in their CSR policies.

A Draft Red Herring Prospectus (DRHP) has been filed by Gland Pharma Ltd.
The DRHP is meant for Gland Pharma's proposed Initial Public Offering (IPO).
The IPO comprises of an offer for sale of equity shares by Fosun Pharma Industrial Pte. Ltd, Gland Celsus Bio Chemicals Private Ltd, Empower Discretionary Trust and Nilay Discretionary Trust.
Gland Pharma Ltd is a Hyderabad-based company. It was formed in 1978.
Draft Red Herring Prospectus (DRHP) is also known as offer document. It provides information about IPO-making Company.

CII-ITC Sustainability Award 2019 has been won by NTPC Limited., which is a Maharatna PSU under power ministry.
NTPC has won the award under Outstanding Accomplishment in Corporate Excellence Category.
NTPC has also got Commendation for Significant Achievement in the category of CSR.
NTPC's CSR programme is Girl Empowerment Mission. It has also started Contractors' Labour Information Management System (CLIMS).
CII-ITC Centre of Excellence for Sustainable Development (CESD) has started awards in 2006.
NTPC is largest power generation company of India. Its headquarters are in New Delhi. It was formed in 1975.

Exclusive Business Development Unit has started at Trichy Railway Division, Tamil Nadu.
The unit aims to double the Railways freight transport by 2024.
Trichy Railway Division comes under southern railway zone, which has six railway divisions.
The headquarters of southern railway zone is in Chennai.
Other five divisions of southern railway zone are Chennai, Madurai, Salem, Palakkad and Thiruvananthapuram.

$700 million has been invested by British Petroleum in India's Green Growth Equity Fund.
Shell India now owns 20% stake in Orb Energy, which is Bangalore-based solar energy firm.
In December 2019, Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) has announced its plan for investing Rs 2,500 crore in green energy during 5 to 7 years.
IOC plans to increase its solar and wind power generation capacity from 216 MW in 2019 to 260 MW in 2020.
ONGC has also planned to increase its renewable energy capacity from 176 MW to 5-10 GW by 2040.
India is having commitment to lower emission intensity or level of pollutants emitted per unit of GDP by 33-35% from the 2005 levels.