08.10.2006

11th Plan (2007-2012) expenditure on infrastructure envisaged
Rs. 14,50,000 cr ($320 bn) on road, rail, air and water transport, electric power, telecommunications, water supply and irrigation.

Indian railways
Plans to invest Rs. 3.5 lk crore by 2012 to develop private container trains, freight corridors and upgrade stations.

Freight carried by railways has risen to 668 mln tonnes getting a revenue of Rs. 36,490 cr.

Reasons for increase in freight traffic:

• Fall in average turnaround time (the round trip time) for the wagons between two loadings from 7 days to 5 days.
• Increase in the load the wagons carry by 4-8 tonnes.

Railways plans to carry 750 mln tonnes and 6.5 bn people this year by March end 2007.

Private and foreign banks nibble away at public sector banks’ share
SBI and associate banks accounted for 22.9% in aggregate deposits and 22.6% of credit in the banking system for the year 2005-06.

Public sector banks as a group accounted for 48.5% of the deposits and 47.6% in the credit during previous quarter.

Private sector banks increased their share in deposits from 19.4% to 20.3%. Foreign banks increased their share in deposits from 5.3% to 5.4%.

Private sector banks share in credit is at 20.3% and that of foreign banks is at 6.9%.

Linux spreads
Microsoft has 68% share in server market vs Linux’s 21% share currently. Two years ago Linux’s share was just 11%.

On the desktop just 3% PCs in India use Linux.

Indian Linux market is expected to grow by 21% annually to $19.9 mln in 2010.

Opportunity in adversity
The relief, rehabilitation and recovery market is a big opportunity.

On an average 70% of the relief money goes to temporary shelter tents and roofs

60% of reconstruction money goes in macro-infrastructure including roads, electricity, bridges, school buildings and water supply systems

60% of the recovery money goes into setting up disaster management authorities, preparedness forces, rescue equipment and transportation vehicles.

Internet traffic
It is estimated that 2.5 bn emails per day contain pornographic content (8% of total emails) and that there are over 68 mln porn search engine requests daily (25% of search engine requests).

Everyday there are more than 70 mn requests for pornography made on search engines like Google and Yahoo.