ICICI will introduce a range of option pricing for corporates who want to lock in to long term funding. A start has already been made with ICICI sanctioning some loans where the corporates will pay half a percentage point over the lending rate for locking into a fixed rate of interest for a period of three years arid above. The optional pricing clause will be mainly for loans having a maturity of three and five years.

Russi Mody to fly on ‘privatisation’

Privatisation of the management in the two national carriers is top on the agenda of Mr. Russi Mody, Chairman of Indian Airlines and Air-India. “I have always believed that who holds equity is not really important. What is more important is who manages and that management must be professional,” he told a press conference here today. If this can be achieved in the two airlines, Mr. Mody feels that it can be followed in the public sector undertakings also.

Decline in share of R&D spending

The share of Research and Development (R&D) expenditure in the country’s Gross National Product (GNP) has fallen from 0.85 per cent in 1990-91 to 0.83 per cent during 1992-93. Compared to India’s meagre 0.83 per cent share in 1992-93, most developed countries earmarked at least 2 per cent of their GNP on R&D. According to the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research’s latest “Status Report on Science and Technology in India”, between 1988-89 and 1992-93, national expenditure on R&D at current prices rose by 11.3 per cent on a compounded annual growth basis. The GNP growth during the same period was higher at 15.3 per cent.

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