Sonia Gandhi discharged after 11 days in hospital

New Delhi, Jan 1: Union Minister Prakash Javadekar launched a scathing attack on the Aam Aadmi Party and the Congress for allegedly inciting violence in Delhi against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act. Mr Javadekar said the violence over the amended citizenship law that broke out in areas like Jamia Nagar, Seelampur and Jama Masjid "cannot be forgiven".

"In Jamia, the Congress' Asib Khan and AAP's Amanatullah Khan delivered inciting speeches. They spread disinformation. The law is to give citizenship to people and not take citizenship away," Mr Javadekar told reporters.

He said the people of India understand the plans of the Congress and the AAP and both parties should apologise.

"We will bring out the truth. The fight is between anarchists and those who oppose them. Our agenda would be wholesome development of Delhi. The AAP strangulated municipal corporations' attempt on development. Rs 900 crore was not given. Today, the people of Delhi are surprised that the AAP slept through all these 4.5 years and in the remaining six months they have launched schemes," Mr Javadekar said.

"The work is done by someone else and the credit is taken by a different individual," the Union Minister said, referring to allegations that the government led by Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal took credit for work done by BJP-ruled municipal agencies.

"Who did fogging in dengue season? Our corporations organised an awareness drive against water accumulation and dengue cases went down. During corporation polls, Kejriwal said don't choose BJP as dengue will claim lives. Now he is also claiming credit for decrease in dengue cases because of the work done by these corporations," Mr Javadekar said.

"I am an environment minister. We worked on pollution control. There is no limit to their (AAP's) lies. About unauthorised colonies, the AAP says we have not regularised it. We made a law signed by the President, yet they spread lies," Mr Javadekar said.

The election in Delhi will be held before the end of February.

May 11: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Monday said many states were amending labour laws, but the fight against the novel coronavirus pandemic cannot be an excuse to exploit workers, suppress their voice and crush their human rights.

Gandhi said there cannot be any compromise on the basic principles by allowing unsafe workplaces.

"Many states are amending labour laws. We are together fighting against corona, but this cannot be an excuse to crush human rights, allow unsafe workplaces, exploit workers and suppress their voice," he said.

"There cannot be any compromise on these basic principles," he added.

Congress leader Jairam Ramesh also said it would be dangerous and disastrous to loosen labour, land and environment laws in the name of economic revival and stimulus.

"In the name of economic revival and stimulus, it will be dangerous and disastrous to loosen labour, land and environmental laws and regulations as the Modi govt is planning.

"The first steps have already been taken. This is a quack remedy like demonetisation," Ramesh tweeted.

New Delhi, Mar 6: Shares of YES Bank and State Bank of India came under huge selling pressure on Friday as developments unfolded regarding SBI picking stake in the private lender. Shares of the lender hit record low of Rs 5.55, plunging 85 per cent, and were trading below its previous low of Rs 8.16 hit on March 9, 2009.

SBI, on the other hand, slumped 11 per cent to Rs 257.35 on the BSE. The benchmark S&P BSE Sensex was trading with a cut of over 3 per cent at 37,251.37 level.

In the past three months, share price of the private lender has plunged 41 per cent, while the state-owned lender has slipped 14 per cent. In comparison, the S&P BSE Sensex has dipped 5.6 per cent till Thursday.

On Thursday, the Reserve Bank of India superseded the board of troubled private sector lender YES Bank and imposed a 30-day moratorium on it “in the absence of a credible revival plan” amid a “serious deterioration” in its financial health.

During the moratorium, which came into effect from 6 pm on Thursday, YES Bank will not be allowed to grant or renew any loans, and “incur any liability”, except for payment towards employees’ salaries, rent, taxes and legal expenses, among others.

This is the first time that a bank of this size will be put under a moratorium by the RBI.

“The financial position of YES Bank had undergone a steady decline “largely due to inability of the bank to raise capital to address potential loan losses and resultant downgrades, triggering invocation of bond covenants by investors, and withdrawal of deposits,” RBI said in a statement.

“After the moratorium, the next step will be to infuse to money and keep the bank afloat. So from shareholders’ point of view, the future is certainly hazy as the capital requirement is huge. The good part, however, is that the RBI has stepped in and depositors don't have to worry,” says Siddharth Purohit, a research analyst at SMC Securities.

Meanwhile, analysts at Nomura believe that placing the Bank under moratorium implies that equity value in the bank would be negligible, and that the chances of private capital participating in future capital raising plan are near zero.

"Any resolution for Yes Bank is more proposed from the perspective of deposit holders and systemic stability, and not from the perspective of Yes Bank equity investors or even perpetual bond holders," they wrote in a note dated March 6.

In another development, SBI’s Board Thursday gave in-principle approval to consider an “investment opportunity” in YES Bank, even as it said “no decision had yet been taken to pick up stake in the bank”.

According to a  report, highly-placed sources indicated a rescue plan involving SBI and Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) was being discussed and an announcement in this regard might be made soon.

“While the finer details of the deal are being worked out, it is anticipated that both SBI and LIC together will take a 51 per cent stake in the bank, with a one-year lock-in period,” the report said.

Most analysts believe it is a positive step for the Indian financial sector as the government has tried to avoid a repeat of IL&FS-like crisis.

“The move is a positive step for the financial sector as a whole. By this, the government has tried to avoid a repeat of IL&FS-like crisis and has saved the depositors,” said AK Prabhakar, Head of Research at IDBI Capital. While we know that YES Bank has a huge pile of bad loans, SBI is the only bank that has the capacity to absorb it, he added.

However, the valuation at which YES bank would be taken over remains a cause of concern.

Global brokerage firm JP Morgan Thursday cut its target price for YES Bank on Thursday to Rs 1 per share, taking into account the potential fall in the lender’s net worth due to stressed assets.

“We believe forced bailout investors will likely want the bank to be acquired at near-zero value to account for risks associated with the stress book and likely loss of deposits. We think the bank will need to be recapitalised at nominal equity value and could test dilution of additional tier 1 (AT1) capital. We remain underweight and cut our target price to Rs 1 as we believe net worth is largely impaired,” JP Morgan said in a note.

Global brokerage firm Nomura estimates a need of Rs 25,000-44,000 crore and adjusted for Rs 7,400 crore of current coverage, if the current stress of Rs 65,000-70,000 crore faces 70 per cent loss given default (LGD).

"It implies Rs 18,000-37,000 crore needed for provisioning against the current net worth of Rs 25,700 crore Also, to run as going concern, the bank would require over Rs 20,000 crore of CET-1 capital as well," the note said.

YES Bank has registered slippages of Rs 12,000 crore so far in FY20, while it has placed Rs 30,000 crore of loan assets under the watch list. Its deposits stood at Rs 2.09 trillion on September 30, 2019, while its advances totalled Rs 2.24 trillion. The bank has delayed publishing its December quarter results by a month to March 14.