MUMBAI -- Federation of Associations of Maharashtra has announced that all agricultural produce traders from the State would begin an indefinite bandh from May 2 onwards. The traders are protesting a government notification which asks traders in agricultural produce market yards to bear marketing expenses like tolai, hamali and dalali instead of by the farmers. The federation has appealed to the State government to revoke the order by Thursday.

CSE down

CALCUTTA -- Industrials lost fresh ground today on the Calcutta Stock Exchange in listless dealings as buyers continued to stay on sidelines. Both investors and speculators preferred to make a pause as they were perhaps induced to do so in the absence of driving force.

The turnover was small and undertone quiet. The CSE 40-share index finished the day at 2,226.31 points, the highest and lowest being 2251.79 and 2,222.53 points respectively.

ACC recovered modest ground at Rs 1,583 while GujrataAmbuja finished higher at Rs 300. Tisco traded at Rs 147.40, Telco at Rs 276, Spic at Rs 32.35, Bata at Rs 148, Bajaj Auto at Rs 595, Castrol at Rs 689.80, ITC at Rs 768.70 and Reliance at Rs 188.20 with L&T at Rs 249.

SUN F&C MF

MUMBAI -- Sun F&C Mutual Fund has waived in full both sales and redemption charges on the purchase and redemption of the units of its SUN F&C Value Fund, with effect from April 23, 1998 until further notice. An investor is therefore now free to enter and exit fund at NAV, without paying any charges whatsoever, said a company press release. The existing notice period of 15 days for redemptions, however, remains. Sun F&C Value Fund, the maiden domestic fund from the Sun F&C was launched in July 1997 and became an open-ended on a daily basis since February 2, 1997.

Bharti BT

MUMBAI -- Bharti BT is implementing a 209 site VSAT network that will enable nationwide connectivity of Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd. This is one of India's largest VSAT connectivityexercises in terms of geographic spread and is also the first major VSAT network implementation undertaken by a public sector unit. The VSAT network supports data and voice traffic, between corporate and branch offices, refineries, despatch units, depots, LPG plants and airfields. These include several remote locations such as Bucher Island, Sewere, Koyali, Khurda and Rewari where no phone lines exist.

Farley Cutting

MUMBAI -- Farley Cutting Systems, an Australian company excelling in plasma, oxy fuel and water jet cutting technologies has secured its first and major contract from Mazgaon Docks Ltd. Winner of several design and technology awards, targetted sectors for Farely are ship building, heating, ventilation, mining and agricultural equipment manufacturers and airconditioning units. The company is responsibile for many of the technological innovations in metal cutting field, said a company statement.

JM Mutual Fund

MUMBAI -- JM Mutual Fund is launching an equity scheme, JM IndexFund. The scheme will come in two plans, plan A which will track the BSE sensex and plan B which will track the NSE Nifty. The objective will be to track the respective indices and therefore the JM Index Fund will be a "passive" fund and not an "active" one. The corpus under both the plans would be invested in the respective indices to the extent of the weightage of each of the stocks in the respective indices. The fund will be an open ended with an initial lock-in period of six months.