Business Confidential: Reader’s digest

Reader's digest

Officials in the PMO have certainly been reading up. The annual expenditure incurred on purchase of newspapers and magazines in the Prime Minister's Office during the last three years was Rs 11.92 lakh (in 2009-10), 15.80 lakh (2010-11) and Rs 14.30 lakh in the last fiscal. The increase in expenditure on newspapers and magazines during the last two years, according to PMO officials, is mainly due to increase in the prices of publications.

PSB chiefs get media shy

In sharp contrast to their usual forthrightness, chairmen of public sector banks chose to remain tight lipped after their meeting with finance minister P Chidambaram earlier this week. While PSB heads are mostly forthcoming about discussions in such meetings, this time around most of them did not even share plans about their organisations — a subject they are keen to discuss on most occasions. So keen were they to avoid any media glare, that they even timed their exit with that of the finance minister.

What about SUUti?

Amid the financial stress in the government, the big surprise is why there is no movement in selling off the shares of companies that are held by SUUTI? The corpus can yield a sum close to Rs 60,000 crore at current prices. But for all the three, ITC, L&T and Axis Bank there is some plausible story that forestalls their sale, including corporate rivals and rivals from overseas that could gobble up these companies.

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