Friday, October 30, 2009

Project Topics (cases) for Students of B.Com.(H) 1st Year Section-4

Each of the students has to prepare a write-up on two cases pertaining to relevant Acts of the Business Law Paper. The relevant Acts are::
1.The Indian Contract Act 1872,
(Link to list of some cases:
http://www.du.ac.in/course/material/ug/llb/principal-of-contract-tr1-09.pdf
Link to case material:
http://www.du.ac.in/course/material/ug/llb/principal-of-contract-tr1d-09.pdf)

2.Indian Sale of Goods Act 1932,
(Link to list of some cases:
http://www.du.ac.in/course/material/ug/llb/Comm_Trans_4Contents.pdf
Link to case material:
http://www.du.ac.in/course/material/ug/llb/Commercial Transactions.pdf)

3.Information Technology Act 2000 and

4.Negotiable Instrument Act.
(Link to list of some cases:
http://www.du.ac.in/course/material/ug/llb/Nego_Instru_6.pdf
Link to case material:
http://www.du.ac.in/course/material/ug/llb/Negotiable%20Instruments.pdf)

The two cases should not be related to a single Act.

No student would select any case which has already been selected by any other student. The write-up on each case should consist of at least 600 words. You can submit hand-written or typed answers. Source of the written matter should be specified in "References".

Each student is supposed to declare his/her selection of cases by leaving a comment to this blog article. Please specify your roll no., full name, names of the cases and the relevant Act. Last date for submission of the Assignment is 19th December.






S.No.Roll No.Case 1Case 2
1181

2185

3189

4193Mohiri Bibi vs. Dharmodas Ghosh
5194

6195

7199Street vs Blay(sales of goods act)
8201Hadley vs. Baxendale,1854
(Indian Contract Act 1872).
Kursell vs Timber Operators and Contractors Limited,1927
9213
Telu Ram Jain vs M/S Aggarwal and Sons (Sale of Goods Act)
10217

11218

12221

13225

14226

15227

16228

17232Felthouse Vs Bindley
18233

19239Ratan Lal vs. Metropolitan Insurance
Co. Ltd. (Indian Contract Act 1872)
Union of India vs. K H Rao 1977 (Sale of Goods Act)
20240Baflour vs Baflour(indian contract act)Tarling vs Baxter (sale of goods act)
21241

22242

23247

24248

25256

26258Dada Silk Mills And Ors.vs Indian Overseas BankBanarsi Dass And Co.vs Lulla Mal
27264Kumbakonam Electric Supply vs Join Commercial Tax OfficerMuthaya Manivaran vs Lakku Reddiar And Ors.
28265

29288

30294

31296Abdul Aziz v/s Masum Ali Macdonald v/s Longbottom
32297Doraiswami Iyer v Arunachala Ayyar(Indian Contract Act) Butterworth v Kingsway Motors Ltd(Sale Of Goods Act)
33298

34299Harris vs. Nickerson's(1873)(Indian Contract Act)Griffith v Peter Conway (1939)(S G Act)
35300

36301

37302

38303

39304

40305

41306

42307Carlill vs carbolic smoke ball company(1893).Badri Prasad vs. State of Madhya Pradesh (Sale of Goods Act)
43308

44309

45316

46319


Sunday, October 4, 2009

BANKER'S TRUST - ANY HTM HIKE WILL BE A BLOW TO CREDIT MARKET

Bond yields and prices move in opposite direction. This means that if the yields rise, bond prices decline, and in case the current price of bonds is lower than the price at which they were acquired, banks need to book depreciation, or MTM, losses. They can escape this if their entire bond holding is kept under the so-called held-to-maturity, or HTM, category, and many Indian banks are pushing for it.
Under current norms, they are required to invest 24% of their deposits in government bonds, down from 25% a year ago. But up to 25% of deposits invested in bonds can be kept under the HTM category. Then why do they need to book depreciation losses in case bond yields go up? Well, the overall bond holding of Indian banks is now much higher than the stipulated 24% of their deposits; it is around 28%.
This is because of the government's massive borrowing programme. The government plans to borrow a record Rs4.51 trillion from the market to bridge a fiscal deficit that is estimated at 6.8% of gross domestic product, or GDP.

In the February interim budget, finance minister Pranab Mukherjee had projected Rs3.62 trillion of market borrowing by the government in fiscal 2010, through its investment banker Reserve Bank of India, or RBI. At that time, the fiscal deficit for the year was estimated to be 5.5% of India's Rs54.3 trillion GDP.

In the first half of the fiscal year, RBI borrowed Rs2.95 trillion from the market. It will borrow Rs1.23 trillion in the second half. The rest, Rs33,000 crore, is being generated by transferring RBI's intervention bonds to the government.
These bonds were floated between 2004 and 2007 under the Market Stabilisation Scheme, or MSS, to soak up excess liquidity that was created because of RBI's intervention in the foreign exchange market. The central bank was buying dollars to check the rupee's appreciation because a strong local currency hurts exporters. For every dollar that RBI bought, an equivalent amount of rupees flowed into the system and the central bank sucked out the excess money through MSS bonds.

There are three categories of bonds in a bank's bond portfolio--HTM, available for sale (AFS) and available for trade (AFT). While bonds kept under HTM are not affected by volatility in interest rates, banks need to provide for depreciation of bonds kept under the other two categories. RBI is reportedly considering a proposal to raise the HTM limit, and the 10-year benchmark bond yield dropped almost 0.5 percentage point from the second week of September to close to 7% by the end of the month after RBI officials made public announcements on this. If indeed the central bank decides to raise the HTM limit, it will be able to protect bank balance sheets from the impact of rising rates and also push down the yield on bonds, but this will deal a blow to the credit market.

Banks have two avenues to park money--buying bonds or keeping it with RBI. While the average cost of incremental deposits is around 5.5-6%, banks can earn 3.25% by keeping money with RBI or around 7% by buying bonds. Right now they need to make the risk-return analysis while choosing between the RBI window and buying bonds but once the HTM limit is raised, they will be tempted to buy more bonds for risk-free higher returns. So, the HTM limit should not be raised.

Starting April 2011, Indian banks will shift to International Financial Reporting Standards and have the freedom to decide how much of their bond portfolio will be kept in the HTM category. There will be no cap on any of the categories, but the boards of banks will decide at the beginning of every year to what extent they can sell bonds kept in the HTM category, and the banks will have to stick to that.

Tamal Bandyopadhyay keeps a close eye on all things banking from his perch as Mint's deputy managing editor in Mumbai.