NPPA strikes
New Delhi: The National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) plans to issue showcause notices to drug companies for increasing the maximum retail prices of 331 drug packs beyond the permissible limit.

The major drug companies likely to be hit with the notice include Dr Reddy's, Emcure, Torrent and Cadilla. A large number (279) of the notices are of preliminary nature seeking explanation from the companies on the apparently abnormal price rise, 52 are of serious nature where the NPPA is not satisfied with the initial replies from the companies.

Usually, companies provide valid reasons for the price increase or they agree to reduce the prices to the permissible level (up to 10 per cent increase in a year). In the case of the 52 notices, the companies will either reduce the prices, or let the NPPA prescribe the maximum retail price.

The NPPA has so far issued notices to recover about Rs1,400 crore from drug companies for violation of the government-set prices.

While the 52 notices are for medicines where prices underwent a 20 per cent increase, the rest are mostly instances where a 10 per cent and above price increase was seen. The basis for calculation of price increase is the retail stockist price data supplied by market research organisation IMS-ORG.
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Better infrastructure required for growth in India: WTO
London: The infrastructure sector continues to cripple India's growth potential, the World Trade Organisation said in a report on Wednesday.

WTO said, "India's economic performance has continued to be impressive since 2001-02 and growth has been particularly rapid since 2003-04 averaging over 8.5 per cent with over 9 per cent expected for 2006-07," the WTO said it's Trade Policy Review on India.

However, if India's high rates of economic growth are to be sustained, reforms need to be deepened, in particular to address infrastructure bottlenecks such as transport and electricity, which continue to constrain growth, it added.

India's robust economic growth in the recent past has been largely due to unilateral trade and structural reforms, in particular in services, according to the WTO Secretariat report.

Rapid economic growth has also resulted in an improvement in social indicators such as poverty and infant mortality, it said.

Continued structural reform, the report notes, together with greater investment in physical and human capital would also help to generate much needed productive employment for new entrants to the labour force, it said.
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Govt to increase expenditure on road development: PM
New Delhi: The government has pledged to dramatically increase its spending on roads in rural areas to boost sluggish farm growth and reduce poverty.

According to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh the government would spend Rs480 billion on a four-year project ending in 2009 to connect 66,000 villages.

He said rural road connectivity is a critical component of the government's overall strategy for rural development. It promotes access to economic and social services and facilitates the growth processes on our rural economy. The Prime Minister also told government officials that corruption was holding back development. In the fiscal year that ended in March the finance ministry pledged to spend Rs52 billion on the rural road network.
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Reduced power cuts in Maharashtra
Mumbai: Maharashtra State Electricity Distribution Company (MSEDCL) has reduced power cuts by a few hours in rural and urban areas in the state. This follows the availability of an additional 800 MW to 1,000 MW of power, a dip in demand and pre-monsoon showers in parts of the state, a MSEDCL release on Wednesday.

Outages in rural areas have been reduced by three-and- half hours and by one-and-half hours in urban areas.

Villages and cities have been grouped in four categories - A, B, C and D - for the load shedding. Power cuts will be reduced to 10-and-half hours, 11 hours, 11-and- half hours and 12 hours for the four categories respectively.

On the same basis, load shedding in major cities will be three hours, three hours and 45 minutes, four-and-half hours, and five hours and 15 minutes respectively for the four categories whereas it was from four-and-half hours to six hours earlier.

In smaller cities, power cuts will be for five hours, five-and-half hours, six hours and six-and-half hours respectively for the A, B, C and D categories while it was for six-and-half hours to eight hours earlier.
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