MUMBAI; Jammu Kashmir (J&K) Bank paid advance tax of ₹152 crore for the last quarter of the current financial year 2013-14.

The private sector bank paid a total advance tax of ₹593 crore, which is 18.36 per cent higher than the tax paid for the last financial year.

Notably, last week the bank’s share price touched a 52-week high of ₹1,551 on BSE and ₹1,550 on the National Stock Exchange. It ended weaker by 0.62 per cent (9.40 points) at ₹1,515 per share.

On the Bombay Stock Exchange, the shares ended 0.54 per cent weaker by 8.20 points to close at ₹1,514 per share on Saturday.

ISLAMABAD; Pakistan said on Friday it will strike a liberalized trade deal with India only after a new government takes over following the Lok Sabha elections.

The PML-N government here has put off a cabinet meeting scheduled for Friday that would have discussed among other things the long-pending NDMA (non-discriminatory market access) status to India to boost bilateral trade ties.

Information and Broadcasting Minister Pervaiz Rashid said one of the reasons for postponement was that all cabinet members were not available for the meeting.

India is going for elections in May, and the PML-N government would now strike a trade deal with the new government, he was quoted as saying by the Dawn daily.

Sources told PTI that the cabinet meeting on the issue will now take place in "couple of weeks".

Commerce Ministry spokesman Muhammad Ashraf said that the cabinet was scheduled to discuss, among other things, matters related to trade with India during the meeting.

"The Ministry always remains prepared and provides professional input to the cabinet whenever a matter related to trade is to be discussed in the cabinet," Ashraf said.

The cabinet meeting was to take two important decisions regarding trade with India — abolishing the negative list of tradable items (1,209 items) and allowing import of more than 7,000 items via Wagha border. Currently, only 138 items are importable from India via this route.

NDMA is a nomenclature chosen by the Pakistan government to avoid political ramifications at home of giving India the most-favoured nation (MFN) status.

Information Minister had said earlier this week that Pakistan will deliver on promises made to India regarding normalisation of bilateral trade ties.

"The previous PPP government made certain promises to India on trade and we will deliver on these promises. The promises were made by Pakistan government and we are not promising anything extra," Rashid had told reporters.

A special government panel chaired by Finance Minister Ishaq Dar has already decided to ask the federal cabinet to approve a fresh roadmap for granting NDMA status to India.

India has agreed to provide a level playing field to Pakistani traders and will give tariff concession on various products pertaining to strong sectors such as textile, cement, surgical instruments from here. 

SRINAGAR; The Kashmir Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) organised the fifth International Buyer Seller meet in a bid to promote indigenous handicraft and handloom products in the international market.

Foreigners have a feel of Kashmiri art during 5th International Buyer Seller Meet organized by KCCI

With the finest of Indian handicraft products on display, the event proved a riot of colours, designs and innovations which undoubtedly give a boost to the Kashmiri handicraft business.

Some sixty odd number of stalls displayed an array of handicraft products like carpets, shawls, paper machie products and wood carved products. The meet was attended by traders and buyers from twenty eight countries worldwide including Italy, Spain, Germany, Saudi Arabia and many more European countries.

Enthusiastic visitors thronged the exhibition of products and the interaction provided the much needed exposure to the artisans and to Indian Handicrafts.

Organiser and KCCI president Sheikh Ashiq said that these kinds of initiatives are a boon to the handicraft trade.

"This kind of interaction gives an exposure to indigenous products in the international market. The international traders get to learn about our handicraft and handloom products and more interactions ensure better trade," said Ashiq.

Famous handicraft products like Pashminas and carpets topped the list of popularity among the International buyers.

"We are looking for scarves, especially Pashminas. We had Pashminas before from India but not from Kashmir, which are famous. And maybe we would like to see some other stufs like carpets and may be some oriental handmade stuff," said a buyer from Slovakia, Benjemin.

Along with offering a slew of handpicked products, the event was a meeting ground for the buyers and the artisans who are hardly able to market their products abroad.

Local entrepreneur, Gazala Amin said that small artisans who are hardly able to market their products reached the international traders at the event and demonstrated the kind of labour and intricacies put into making these products.

"The major exporters can go abroad to exhibit their products but the artisans who are not able to travel to other countries to market their products are given exposure at this platform. KCCI has taken this initiative to invite international business houses, traders, buyers to come and explore the Indian products and to learn how much effort is put into the making of these products," said Amin.

Kashmiri handicrafts are known throughout the world for their artistic work and grandeur. The vast cultural and ethnic diversity of Kashmir has enabled a variety of motifs, techniques and crafts to flourish on this land.

The various handicrafts are in tune with its age-old splendid civilisation, which has been perfected over centuries. Be it Kashmiri carpets, shawls, paper machie or any other craft, it is only the Kashmiri artisan who can perfectly carve out the master pieces of Kashmiri art and craft. 

NEW DELHI; To tackle militant activities, the Indian Defence Ministry has asked the Department of Telecom to exclude Jammu and Kashmir from the proposed plan for full mobile number portability, which allows a customer to retain number in any part of the nation after changing operators.

Under National Telecom Policy, the government has envisaged the concept of ‘One Nation One Number’ by allowing full MNP. At present, customers are allowed to change their mobile service provider without changing their number only within a state or service area.

Under full MNP, customers will be allowed to switch service providers throughout the country without changing their mobile numbers. Full MNP is yet to be approved by the government.

The Defence Ministry, as per official sources, has told the DoT that “The ‘One Nation One Number’ provision of the Telecom Policy 2012 should not be implemented in J&K.”

The Ministry has also asked the DoT to work with the Ministry of Home Affairs and National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO) to intercept VoIP (making voice call using Internet) through 2G connections and selectively ban mobile Internet at locations identified as militant ‘hotspots’.

These “communication services” need to be “denied” in the affected areas for the effective conduct of counter insurgency and militant operations, official sources added.

The Ministry has also raised concern over mobile signals from towers located in Pakistan penetrating into India up to a distance of about 20 kilometres from the Line of Control.

“The matter (mobile signals from Pakistan) may be taken up with Ministry of External Affairs so that the same is resolved in accordance with policy guidelines by International Telecom Union,” official sources said.

Indian Defence Ministry had already bocked Short Messaging Service in Jammu and Kashmir since 2010 mass uprising. Beyond mobile services, Indian authorities have also banned local cable news and international Press TV in the restive region.

JAMMU; Minister for Finance Mr. Abdul Rahim Rather today informed the House that Government has realized revenue of Rs. 9624.63 crore as tax collections during last two fiscals through Excise and Commercial Taxes Departments in the State.

Replying to a question by Mr. Harsh dev Singh, the Minister informed that Rs. 7117.61 crore were realized in Jammu Division while as Rs. 2507.01 crore stand realized in Kashmir Division in the form of different tax collections during the said period.

The Minister informed that in Commercial Taxes Department the value of taxable Imports was Rs. 57313.53 crore while as value of taxable Exports was Rs. 25050.21 crore and taxes were realized as GST, VAT and Entry Taxes to the tune of Rs. 6251.98 crore during last two fiscals.

Mr. Rather said that no tax is being recovered under the J&K Urban Immoveable Property Tax Act, as the Act stands repealed by the Government.

The Finance Minister as regards the Excise Department said that adequate supervisory field staff has been deployed to check the menace of tax evasion at manufacturing and whole sale levels.
He said task force has been constituted under the supervision of Deputy Excise Commissioners (Executive) Jammu/Kashmir and Deputy Excise Commissioners Distilleries Jammu for checking evasion of tax.

He said 710 toll evasion cases were detected at Toll Post Lakhanpur during last two years and against them a fine of Rs. 44.73 lakh was imposed.

Mr. Rather said that Rs. 30.39 crore has been realized as security/penalty from 31479 dealers/firms found violating provisions of J&K VAT/GST Act during last two fiscals.

SRINAGAR; A few schools in summer capital Srinagar are collecting money from the unemployed youth of Kashmir on the names of jobs.

"Schools are publishing job advertisements in local dailies and it costs them around 200-300 rupees, then they collect rupees 50-200 from each candidate who applies for the job. Although the schools are conducting interviews but no one is being appointed for the job." says a vice-principal of a reputed school on conditions of anonymity.

A Post-graduate unemployed youth Farooq Khan said, "I have applied for the post of mathematics teacher in a school in Rajbagh area in November 2013. I paid an amount of Rupees Hundred for the application form that was prescribed by the school authorities. Later our interview was conducted I was informed on phone that I had not qualified in interview for the said post. A few days earlier I saw the same job notification again published in newspaper. These all are the tricks of school authorities to fill their bank accounts and also to advertise their schools."

Most of the unemployed boys and girls blame Service Selection Board for this. According to them, SSB taught these schools to collect money from the unemployed youth and later no body is being selected.

Youth also demanded that Government should look in these job notifications and the amount for application forms should be fixed by the government and those who are not selected for the job should be refunded.

Pertinently, State is having highest unemployment rate in North India. According to official sources, more than 7 lac youth are unemployed in the state

KN DESK; Jammu & Kashmir (J&K) Bank today said its net profit for the quarter ended September 30, 2013 increased by 12.3 per cent from a year earlier to Rs 302.7 crore as it earned more interest income, improved its margin and kept asset quality stable.

Net interest income, or the difference between interest income and interest expense, grew by 23.4 per cent from a year ago to Rs 681.8 crore during the three-month period. Net interest margin improved 39 basis points year-on-year to 4.33 per cent at the end of the second quarter on account of better liability management.

"Despite stressed economy, we feel confident by our results. Going by the current industry scenario, we have performed really well. Our focus for the last two quarters has primarily been driven by twin objectives of sustaining growth and maintaining a quality asset book. So far, we have pulled it through," Mushtaq Ahmad, chairman and chief executive officer of J&K Bank, said in his post-earnings comments.

The gross non-performing asset ratio was 1.69 per cent, while the net bad loan ratio was 0.19 per cent for July-September period. The non-performing asset coverage ratio was 92.06 per cent at the end of the quarter.

Advances increased by almost 20 per cent year-on-year to Rs 41,120.8 crore. Deposits were up 11.4 per cent from a year earlier at Rs 61,171.2 crore.

"This year, we have already opened five business units in Bangalore, Delhi and Hyderabad. We are prospectively looking at opening 15 more such units this fiscal in Maharashtra, Kerala, Karnataka and Delhi. Our corporate loan book outside the state shall grow, though on a very selective basis," Ahmad said.

Friday, J&K Bank shares ended at Rs 1,293 on the National Stock Exchange (NSE), up 1.2 per cent from previous close. "At the current market price, the stock is trading at a higher end compared to peers, which factors in its better asset quality performance vis-a-vis peers even in a challenging macro environment. Hence, we maintain our neutral recommendation on the stock," Vaibhav Agrawal, vice-president for research - banking at Angel Broking, said in a note to clients.