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The Telecom Disputes Settlements and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT) recently ruled that Loop Telecom, a company controlled by the Ruias of Essar group and their associates, will not be repaid a sum of Rs 1,454.94 crore that it had claimed from the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) after the firm's licence was cancelled by the Supreme Court of India. The September 16 order by the tribunal vindicates the stand adopted in a series of reports drafted in the office of the Comptroller and Auditor...

An article that appeared in thehoot.org in November 2013 has suddenly been attracting considerable attention. Reason: the article was about how Peter and Indrani Mukerjea sold their stake in the INX/NewsX media group of companies and how India's biggest private corporate entity, Reliance Industries Limited, headed by the country's richest man, Mukesh Ambani, acquired control over these firms for a period of time in a convoluted manner. The Hoot stories looked into the examination of these...

Three months before the end of the calendar year, it is already apparent that 2015 will go down in contemporary history as a watershed year for the planet’s political economy. The sharp slowdown in China, the crisis in Greece, the crash in the prices of oil and other commodities and the influx of immigrants to Europe — all make the year’s developments significant. It was exactly seven years ago this month, when the Great Recession began with New York’s Wall Street collapsing, seven decades after...

Three months before the end of the calendar year, it is already apparent that 2015 will go down in contemporary history as a watershed year for the planet’s political economy. The sharp slowdown in China, the crisis in Greece, the crash in the prices of oil and other commodities and the influx of immigrants to Europe — all make the year’s developments significant. It was exactly seven years ago this month, when the Great Recession began with New York’s Wall Street collapsing, seven decades after...

Vivek Kaul is no ordinary journalist interested in the working of the planet’s political economy. Like many “generalist” journalists, he writes on personal finance, marketing and branding. And if that were not enough, he has an abiding interest in cinema and music. But wait! He has written not one, but three books in a row, on the subject of money, credit and finance that seek to make this complicated and difficult topic more accessible to readers who may not be familiar with economics, commerce...

Are prices going up or are they coming down? Is inflation or deflation the bigger problem in India at present? The answers are likely to be diametrically different depending on the person who is being asked these questions. Ask a homemaker shopping for her groceries and she will tell you that the prices of many vegetables and other food items are continuing to rise despite the fall in prices of diesel and petrol. The chief economic adviser to the Government of India in the ministry of finance...

The amounts being sought as damages by corporate entities in India against publications which have allegedly defamed them are reaching stratospheric levels, even if the chances of recovering such sums of money appear rather remote. In what could be the biggest defamation notice of its kind, BSES Limited, a company in the Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group (ADAG), has sought a stupendous Rs 5,000 crore as damages from Bennett, Coleman and Company Limited (BCCL), publishers of the Times of India, the...

Are prices going up or are they coming down? Is inflation or deflation the bigger problem in India at present? The answers are likely to be diametrically different depending on the person who is being asked these questions. Ask a homemaker shopping for her groceries and she will tell you that the prices of many vegetables and other food items are continuing to rise despite the fall in prices of diesel and petrol. The chief economic adviser to the Government of India in the ministry of finance...

Zee Media Corporation got merged with Essel Publishers Pvt Ltd, as cleared by the Bombay High Court on May 2, 2014 with the appointed date of April 1, 2014. Both are Essel Group companies controlled by Subhash Chandra. The scheme was made effective on May 27, 2014 and given effect to in the financial statements for the quarter ended June 30, 2014. Zee Media issued and allotted 12.23 crore equity shares of Re 1 each to the shareholders of Essel Publishers. Thus, the shareholding of promoter group...

“Speak up, it's in your DNA”, was the catchphrase used on July 30, 2005 when the English daily broadsheet Daily News & Analysis(known by its acronym DNA) was launched by Diligent Media Corporation Limited, a 50:50 joint venture between the Essel/Zee group and DB Corp Ltd, the flagship company of the Dainik Bhaskar group, two of India's biggest media conglomerates. The marriage was supposed to be an ideal one. The Essel/Zee group had financial muscle and diverse national and global business...