Sinha's budget to end zero-duty imports
Finance minister Yashwant Sinha has hinted at a basic floor duty for all imports in the forthcoming budget. This implies that concessions like zero-duty imports of select capital goods may be withdrawn.

Institutions, finance firms under state check over stamp-duty evasion
Maharashtra's department of stamps has issued over 20,000 notices to financial institutions, housing-finance companies, foreign and nationalised banks and share brokers for large-scale defaults on stamp-duty payments.

Core sector bags 27% of institutions' funds in 1997-98
The infrastructure sector -- comprising electricity generation, telecommunications, roads, ports and bridges -- has accounted for 26.7 per of the financial institutions' sanctions in 1997-98.

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