2-wheeler financing running on top-gear 

Nandini Sen Gupta and Rachel Chitra | TNN

Updated: Jan 24, 2018, 00:43 IST

Chennai: Nearly a decade after the blood bath in the two-wheeler financing market, this still-low-penetration segment is booming again. Buoyant rural demand has boosted the sales of motorcycles in FY17-18 and scooters too are in top gear.
HDFC Bank has reported around 18-20% growth while some NBFCs too are reporting between 9-15% rise in asset size year-on-year. While some of the financiers who burnt their fingers in the go-go rush of 2008 will not come back, those now in the business say a repeat is unlikely as financiers have figured out that two-wheeler financing is a high-risk, high-volume game.

Although passenger vehicles command the lion's share of auto financing, two-wheelers are now back in the reckoning. HDFC Bank for instance, is all set to complete this financial year with 1.2 million disbursals. The growth has come on the back of some top gear growth in the luxury motorcycle segment as well as resurgence of rural markets.

Said Ashok Khanna, business head, vehicle loans, HDFC Bank, 'Our two wheeler loan book is currently crossing Rs 7000 crore and we are doing business worth Rs 500 crore every month in this segment. This year has seen terrific growth in the two-wheeler business and we are disbursing an average of 1,00,000 vehicles a month,'' he added.

It's not the only financier to clock top gear growth. "We are aware from manufacturers and retailers in the top 15 cities, we operate out of, that it is boom time for two-wheeler financing," said Devang Mody, CEO, Reliance Money. "Currently our market is 60%-65% for motorcycles and 30%-35% for scooters and mopeds. One of the reasons for the boom, apart from good monsoon and buoyant rural demand, is the steady fall in two wheeler finance rates. On rack rates, there has been a fall of 2%-3%. Earlier, it used to be around 25%-26%, but today NBFCs are charging interest rates between 21%-23%," he added.

Two-wheeler financiers say a repeat of the 2008 fiasco is unlikely for several reasons. First, the checks and balances are stricter. Majority of customers today have a CIBIL score and customer contactability has also improved. ''Every customer has a cellphone, bank account, Aadhaar card, so there has been an enormous change in credit infrastructure and we will not see delinquencies like in 2008," said Mody, adding that delinquencies have come down from what it was in the past, but credit cycles will still repeat. "Another hurdle earlier was the cost of KYC verification but with Aadhaar, it has become easier to collect and verify customer details," he said.

Also, banks are using customers in their branch network whose credit background has already been checked to sell both two-wheeler and four-wheeler loans. "We do cross selling with our bank customers and we have been doing 30,000-35,000 two wheelers every month from our own bank branch customers," said Khanna.

And this year is likely to bring in a windfall for them, say financiers, who saw a slump post-demonetisation. "We have seen particularly good growth in two-wheelers, particularly from rural areas; it has been bouyed by a good monsoon and stronger consumer spending. We are expecting a strong uptick in sales this January-April this year more than usual as even otherwise this period has always been profitable for vehicle financiers," said S V Parthasarathy, head, consumer finance, IndusInd Bank.

Kuwait announces general amnesty, huge relief for overstaying Indians

Sushil.Rao@timesgroup.com

Hyderabad: With the Kuwait government announcing a general amnesty, thousands of Indian workers stuck there because of illegally extended stay will be able to return to India without having to pay any penalty. The amnesty is in place from January 29 to February 22, 2018. “This comes as a great relief to workers,” said social welfare activist Shaheen Sayyed who had taken up the cause of the Indian workers in Kuwait.

Naresh Naidu, a worker who was employed with Kharifi National and overstayed to demand that his salary dues be released by the company, is one among those keen to make use of the amnesty. He hails from West Godavari in Andhra Pradesh and told TOI over telephone from Kuwait that on Tuesday he went to the Indian embassy in Kuwait and gave his details so that he could return to the country. “I found many workers from the Telugu states are eager to return to the country,” he said.

The penalty for overstaying in Kuwait is 2 Kuwaiti dinar — ₹424. Many workers who didn’t receive their salaries had overstayed for several months. They couldn’t even think of making an exit from the country by paying penalty as they had no money.

The amnesty granted by the Kuwaiti government comes in the wake of Union minister of state for external affairs VK Singh’s recent visit to Kuwait. He had taken up the issue of many Indian workers who were not paid by Kharafi National Company. He also spoke to the Kuwaiti government minister to waive off penalty for Indian workers overstaying in Kuwait and wanted to return to India.

Meanwhile, Kharafi National officials have made an offer to release 25% to 33% of the salary dues for the disgruntled workers but the workers have been demanding 100% pending dues from the company.

Pondy medical students get relief from high court

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Chennai: In a big relief to scores of postgraduate medical students who were ordered by the Medical Council of India to be discharged from two Puducherry-based medical colleges, the Madras high court stayed the MCI orders till February 6.

Last month, the MCI had directed three medical colleges in Puducherry to discharge a total of 105 postgraduate medical students citing various irregularities in their admissions.

On Tuesday, Justice R Mahadevan, hearing the writ petitions of students studying at Sri Venkateshwara Medical College and Hospital and Pondicherry Institute of Medical Sciences, granted the interim stay saying, “In the interest of justice, there shall be an order of interim stay till February 6, 2018." He then directed the MCI, the Centre and the Puducherry government to file their counter-affidavits.

It was MCI’s contention that those students had been admitted in violation of norms, and that they did not fulfil the minimum eligibility criteria as fixed by MCI.

The colleges concerned, it said, had not sent the correct list of eligible candidates to MCI.

Countering the charges, the students submitted that MCI’s December 21, 2017 order, confirming its own earlier order dated July 24, 2017, asking Venkateswara Medical College to discharge its PG medical students of 2017-18 batch, had been passed without any notice to the students concerned, and without affording them the opportunity of personal hearing. Hence it is vitiated, they said.

The only reason cited by MCI is that names of the students were found in the list provided by the nodal agency – CENTAC.

Denying the charge, the students submitted that the MCI had failed to see that they had directly reported PIMS on the instructions given by CENTAC authorities. CENTAC issued the said instructions as per the directive of the Union ministry of health and family welfare.

They said PG medical seats were vacant at PIMS and added that either there were no takers at all for the seats or candidates originally allotted had not reported for admission.

Sasi seeks till Feb 10 to appear before I-T

Sivakumar.B@timesgroup.com

Chennai: Former chief minister J Jayalalithaa’s aide V K Sasikala has asked income tax officials to give her till February 10 to appear before them in connection with the department’s probe of undeclared investments by the sidelined AIADMK leader and her family members.

I-T officials — who are also investigating how a confidential note regarding the multi-crore gutka scam the department had sent to the former chief minister through the then DGP made its way to Sasikala’s rooms in Jayalalithaa’s Veda Nilayam residence — summoned Sasikala after searches in November and December of more than 187 properties linked to her, her relatives and friends.

“We want to question Sasikala about the documents we found,” a senior I-T official said. “We presented an affidavit in the Madras high court based on [the note from] the file of former DGP Ashok Kumar in the gutka case that we found in rooms that she occupied.” He said the department had last week served the summons on Sasikala, who has since February been incarcerated in Bengaluru’s Parappana Agrahara Central Prison in the Jayalalithaa illegal wealth case.

“We have received a letter through her advocate on Tuesday stating that she is on a vow of silence and will be able to appear only after February 10,” the official said. I-T officials also seized pen drives and computer hard disks from the two rooms Sasikala occupied in Veda Nilayam.

Govt opens new dental college in Virudhunagar

Chennai: A 30-bed inpatient facility was inaugurated at the Madras Dental College by health minister C Vijaya Baskar on Tuesday.

Built at ₹1.22crore, it is one of the first such inpatient facilities in a dental college hospital, he said. He also inaugurated an operation theatre and a haematology lab on campus. “We will be inaugurating a dental college in Virudhunagar soon,” he said. This will be the second state-run dental college in the state which runs 23 medical college hospitals. The state is in the process of identifying land closer to a medical college hospital as per the mandate of the Dental Council of India, he said.

The proposed intake for the undergraduate course is 100

 Meanwhile, the state will expand its dental care facilities in all the government hospitals and primary health care centres, he said. The state will add 147 digital x-rays to its PHCs and equip upgraded 39 PHC as well, he said. TNN

Professor booked for embezzling university funds

Siddharth.Prabhakar@timesgroup.com

Chennai: The director of physical education at Vellore-based Thiruvalluvar University has been booked by the Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption (DVAC) for embezzling the university's funds by providing false bills pertaining to sports events.

In one case, he also allegedly pocketed the funds meant for buying vests and shorts for students participating in sports by forcing them to sign vouchers.

The FIR, which charges professor A Amuldoss with cheating, forgery and corruption, was registered last week after a detailed enquiry. The university's inter-division athletic sports meet was held on December 20 in Tiruvannamalai. But Amuldoss allegedly submitted bills for ₹1.2 lakh stating the event was held on December 19 as well.

He submitted bogus bills for ₹15,000 showing purchase of mementos for the physical education professors of affiliated colleges, which were never given, the DVAC enquiry shows.

For this, Amuldoss allegedly purchased 100 wall clocks worth ₹150 each from a stationery shop in Mylapore. However, the shop owner told DVAC that he had provided blank bills to Amuldoss and that he is not even in the business of selling clocks.

For a rowing meet at Panjab University in 2012, Amuldoss allegedly submitted bills for five players whereas only two had actually gone there. For this, he had claimed ₹50,000 from the university. He had submitted bills in the name of 16 players for a weightlifting competition at Panjab University in February 2017. Bills of four players were forged as they had not attended the meet. One of them was down with chicken pox at the time, the DVAC enquiry shows. On other occasions, he allegedly produced fake bills in the names of other professors, the DVAC FIR states.

University sources said a few more officials are under the scanner.

Temple prasadam to soon have expiry date

Yogesh.Kabirdoss@timesgroup.com

Chennai: The famed panchmirtham of the Palani temple is believed to have preservative properties that make it suitable for consumption over a long period, even without refrigeration. But the next time you pay a visit, you will know exactly how long.

Prasadam distributed in temples administered by the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Department (HR&CE) will soon have the shelf life printed on the containers to comply with the norms of the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI).

HR&CE officials said the panchamirtham sold at the Dhandayuthapani Swamy Temple in Palani would be the first of the prasadams to have an expiry date.

“We have sent the panchamirtham to the food safety authority for determination of its shelf life. After they issue a licence, we will start printing the date of expiry on the tins marketed at the counters of the temple,” a senior HR&CE official told TOI.

The food safety department will also test the prasadams of other temples to prescribe expiry dates.

Food handlers who prepare the holy prasadam have been trained to follow the norms of the food safety authority with respect to a host of parameters. Recently, 300 food handlers from 20 major temples across Tamil Nadu participated in a workshop on implementation of food safety and hygiene in places of worship under Project BHOG in New Delhi. The project is one of the safe and nutritious food initiatives launched by FSSAI a year ago.

The HR&CE department administers 36,565 temples in the state. While prasadam is sold across the counter in several temples, others provide it free of cost for devotees. Some popular temple prasadams include dosai at the Kallalagar temple at Madurai, idli at the Varadaraja Perumal temple at Kancheepuram and puttu at the Meenakshi Sundareswarar temple in Madurai.

R Jaya, commissioner of HR&CE, told TOI that the FSSAI licence for panchamirtham was expected within 10 days. “Apart from this, steps are being taken to sell prasadams in eco-friendly containers,” she added.

CHECK THE DATE, PLEASE!
Prasadam will soon have the shelf life printed on the containers to comply with the food safety norms