Gurgaon : FIFTEEN months past deadline, the prestigious expressway that would connect the Indira Gandhi International Airport to one of Indias top outsourcing hubs, Gurgaon, remains a road to nowhere.

Despite assurances from the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), its Dhaula Kuan-Gurgaon expressway is now all set to miss the second deadline: December, 2006. And its anybodys guess now when the 27.7-km stretch, which promised to reduce travel time between the two spots to 20 minutes, will actually take off.

It was on April 18, 2002 that the NHAI signed an agreement with Jaypee DSC Ventures Ltd to construct the Access Controlled Highway—9.7 km in Delhi, 18 km in Haryana—on a Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) basis. Today, the NHAI is still waiting for land allotment at some places and fighting red tape at others. So what went wrong?

Pune: Pune-based Bank of Maharashtra has chalked out a national expansion plan and is looking forward to opening new branches in the northern and southern regions as well as in West Bengal.

The public-sector bank has received an authorisation to open 21 additional branches across the country and is expecting the total customer base to increase by at least one lakh.

During the current financial year, it has opened three new branches, taking the total branch network to 1,294 branches and 31 extension counters spread across 22 states and two union territories. Read more Finance news.|

Chennai: Even as the dust settled down on the Gurgaon BPO fraud where confidential data was sold, this time, an embezzlement case has surfaced at the Chennai-based SlashSupport.

According to police, two team leaders working in Chennai misused their authority and created 30 dummy customer e-mail IDs and walked away with more than $91,000 (Over Rs 41 lakh) which was supposed to be paid as refund for dissatisfied customers.

It ran an offer stating that a refund of $29.95 would be paid if a customer is dissatisfied with the product. It had hired Slashsupport for customer relationship management. Two employees created 3,047 dummy refund transactions. Their (Webexs) control systems were apparently not in place. Read more Finance news.

New Delhi: Worlds largest computer maker Dell on Monday said it will set up a manufacturing facility in India.

We have concluded that time is right to consider a manufacturing site in India… we are looking for a location, Dell Chief Executive Officer Kevin Rollins said here today.

Dell, presently, employs 10,000 people at its support and product development centres in India.

Time is ripe for second phase of our expansion in India. We are talking to Federal (Centre) government and state governments as to where is the best place to set up a manufacturing site, Rollins said.

Dell has seven manufacturing plants all over the world and the India unit would be the eighth such facility.

CHENNAI: Even as the dust settled down on the Gurgaon BPO fraud where confidential data was sold, this time, an embezzlement case has surfaced at the Chennai-based SlashSupport. According to police, two team leaders working in Chennai misused their authority and created 30 dummy customer e-mail IDs and walked away with more than $91,000 (Over Rs 41 lakh) which was supposed to be paid as refund for dissatisfied customers.

The modus operandi goes like this: US-based Webex Corp deals with Video Conferencing equipment. It ran an offer stating that a refund of $29.95 would be paid if a customer is dissatisfied with the product. It had hired Slashsupport for customer relationship management.

Two employees created 3,047 dummy refund transactions. Their (Webexs) control systems were apparently not in place. The accused used this to their benefit and made multiple claims on behalf of the same customer, sources said. The refund monies got into the credit card accounts of both the accused. Normally an individual would have credit card dues to the banks, but in this case, both of them had huge debit balances. The banks became suspicious and informed Webex, sources said.

NEW DELHI, JAN 29: The $68 billion Dell Inc. is going to announce its new BPO centre in Gurgaon on Monday. This will be Dells fourth captive centre in India after Mohali, Hyderabad and Bangalore. With this centre, the company aims at taking its total headcount in India to more than 10,000. Apart from BPO, the company is also looking at a manufacturing facility in India as said by its founder chairman Michael Dell at the WEF being held in Davos.

Dell outsources to both its captive and third party BPO vendors like Genpact, Wipro BPO, Sitel and EXL. At the Mohali centre Dell plans to up its headcount by 20% to 1800 employees.The increase in its captive units may lessen the outsourced work to third party vendors. But according to top industry sources, Dell has a lot of potential to outsource and there is room for third party work. But vendors who fail to deliver quality will lose out on Dells business, like it happened with one vendor. Apart from India, Dell outsourcers to Philippines and the Carribean.

Dell does sales, tech support, consumer services from India for its PCs and computer accessories and plans to set up manufacturing unit as well. Dell President and CEO Kevin Rollins will make the announcement of the Gurgaon centre on his second visit to India on Monday.

United colours of malls will be on full display in 2006 as South Delhi and Greater Noida join Gurgaon to welcome shoppers. There will be more brands and better infrastructure, says Nitin Saxena

With the Indian economy growing at boiling temperature, as many as 300 malls are set to come up in the country in the near future. A large number of them are being set up in the NCR region, where Delhi and Gurgaon hold the pride of place. The big question is — how will a particular builder induce a sense of credibility in the mall being built, considering the vast competition. He will have to grant several concessions and set up the facilities on a competitive basis. The competition is stiff and the success or failure of a particular mall will depend on a number of factors. These primarily include the right location, positioning, timing of construction, product mix and, of course, the ambience.

Like a cosmos where the light never dims, shopping malls play multiple roles in modern culture — that of a Godless paradise, of a timeless space, of an absolute getaway without landmarks — complete with the background music, sweet-smelling air, controlled climate, round-the-clock operations, polished halls and, yes, sparkling brands.

With Global prices for a Global skyline, will 2006 belong to Gurgaon? The property scene is set for a resurgence, says Sumit Jha

With the economy touching new heights, the outsourcing business increasing day-by-day and the FDI door opened, there is a new rising trend in purchase of commercial properties all over India. Gurgaon, located in the countrys growth epicentre, is no exception.

The Gurgaon commercial real estate market seems set for the second round of consolidation with most corporates having already re-negotiated current leases or re-located. Once described as just a little town built on a cow pasture, Gurgaon saw a radical change in not just its skyline but also in its basic urban demographics. In the past three years, Gurgaons skyline became overcrowded with full of shiny new office buildings and call centres.

Gurgaons real estate sector has seen amazing growth over the last two years. Infact the year 2005 will surely go down in history for people who have bought or sold during this time; Demand is rapidly increasing in peripheral areas like Sohna and Manesar too, and so is the supply. Suburban Gurgaon, just on the outskirts of Delhi, accounts for the highest number of the transactions in the Northern Sector today.

As per industry sources, of the 2.5 million sq ft of occupied office space in the NCR, about 70 per cent is in Gurgaon alone! What more, with the recent budget predicting around seven million new IT jobs, the going is set to get better. For, if even 1% of these jobs came to Gurgaon, that would translate to 70 lakh sq ft of office space in this posh suburb over the next one year.

NEW DELHI: West Delhi may be hogging all the limelight for being the multiplex and mall hub in the making, but Delhis neighbour Haryana isnt far behind. With the Haryana government slashing entertainment tax by half to 30% and bringing it at par with Delhi, multiplex owners are all set to cash in on the opportunity. Surprisingly, it is not Gurgaon but the tier II cities of the state which are on top of their mind.

Panipat and Karnal will soon be for Haryana what Indore has become for Madhya Pradesh. Until now, Haryana was the only state which did not enjoy tax exemptions. Others like Madhya Pradesh, Delhi and Uttar Pradesh which figure prominently in the real estate companies expansion chart, had different levels of tax exemption for multiplexes.

PVR Cinemas which recently announced plans to set up no frills cinema theatres in the tier II cities may now contemplate expanding into Haryana. Until now, it owns 10 screens in Haryana spread across Faridabad and Gurgaon and plans to add more screens in the region.

Bokaro : Life came to a virtual standstill here today when all entry and exit points to Bokaro were blocked by people agitating against the brutal violence unleashed by the police yesterday on displaced people demanding jobs in the steel plant.

Normalcy was restored only late in the evening. Five kms from the district headquarters at Shivandi, several hundred people put up a roadblock that lasted till 8 pm. The violent mob also attacked police vehicles and broke windscreens while shutting down movement towards Hazaribagh, Ramgarh and Ranchi.

Another blockade on the Purulia Road brought traffic to Jamshedpur to a standstill. Yet another mob shut down the Chas-Garga bridge so as to prevent any movement from the coalfield. Arterial roads at Chandankiari and Topkadih were also blocked to cut off vehicular movement even within the district.

Leaderless mobs displayed amazing coordination to keep Bokaro isolated from the rest of the state throughout the day. The police chose to exercise restraint after yesterdays indiscretions, allowing the mob to control the roads.

Vocal leader of the Jharkhand Berozgar Vikas Manch Phoolchand Mahto and 10 of his equally vocal colleagues had been arrested by the police. But the angry members of the manch persuaded BJP legislator from Bermo Yogesh Kumar Batul to assume their leadership and negotiate with the district administration.