Who's offering them? Companies like Eurocopter and Bell will shortly offer their civilian helicopters for sale on installments.

How does it work? A brand new helicopter (basic model) costs about Rs 10 crore. The companies plan to offer them on one-to-15 year installments. You have to make a down payment of 12-16 per cent and pay the rest in equated monthly installments. If you choose the 15-year payment option, your monthly outgo will be about Rs 7.5 lakh.

Who's financing the scheme? Bell has its own financing arm, called Bell Helicopter Finance Group. Eurocopter is believed to be talking to several banks for the scheme.

When will this scheme be launched? Neither company is answering this question, but it is expected that the scheme will open sometime later this year.

-T.V. Mahalingam

Command Your Computer

The man behind it all: Bill Gates

What's so great about it? Bill Gates believes that in the future, we will all be "talking" to computers as a primary input device (instead of using a device such as a mouse or stylus or even a keyboard), so Vista has taken Voice Recognition (VR) a step further.

Does it work well? You might have teething problems, but this still works quite well.

Problems? Unlike the Mac VR, Vista's VR, once activated, doesn't need a keyword to start listening and doing things, so if you have your speakers turned all the way up and your microphone on, a malicious site can, in the form of an embedded audio file, tell your computer to, well, make life difficult for you.

-Kushan Mitra

ECONOMY WATCH

RUPEE VALUE

Status: Rs 44.04 per dollar as on February 14, 2007.

Impact: Strengthening of the domestic currency against the US dollar spells bad news for exporters, especially the IT industry and a bonanza for importers. Foreign investors will get higher returns if they decide to repatriate some of their returns.

BOND YIELDS

Status: $185 billion (Rs 8,14,000 crore) for the week ended February 9, 2007.

Impact: Rising foreign exchange reserves will strengthen the domestic currency against the dollar. It may also encourage the RBI to relax the limits on foreign exchange that can be taken out of the country for travel, education and investment.

-Compiled by Anand Adhikari

P-WATCH
A bird's eye view of what's hot and what's not on the government's policy radar.

GOVT APPROVES MINORITY SALES IN POWER COMPANIES

Govt approves minority sales in power companies market regulation is superior to government regulation, appears to be the sentiment behind the government's recent move to sell minority stakes in public sector power companies Power Grid Corporation or PGCIL (5 per cent), National Hydroelectric Power Corporation or NHPC (5 per cent) and Rural Electrification Corporation or REC (10 per cent). In the process, it hopes to mop up as much as Rs 1,500 crore through sale of a small part of its equity in the company (see Embracing the Market). Furthermore, a fresh issue of 10 per cent equity will net the PSUs an aggregate of around Rs 2,400 crore.

Not surprisingly, the companies have their share of problems. While PGCIL has transmission assets idling in the North East that costs the transmission utility as much as Rs 700 crore per annum, in the case of NHPC, the company leans on the exchequer to fund its new projects.

Listing power PSUs, clearly, a reform measure, will have a knock-on effect-it will strengthen the Centre's hands in pushing reforms in states.

-Kapil Bajaj

SECURTIY BUG BITES FDI NORMS

Scaling down the foreign investment walls hasn't been easy for this government, given its alliance with the Left parties. However, just when the government gathered the courage to raise the investment limits in sectors ranging from aviation to telecom, the security bug has bitten it hard. National Security Advisor M.K. Narayanan has expressed serious apprehensions about some foreign investors manipulating stock markets in the country to aid "terrorist outfits".

Following this disclosure, the National Security Council Secretariat (NSCS) has been asked to prepare guidelines specifying areas, countries and companies whose investments need to be monitored with greater care.

While the FDI gatekeepers should tread with caution, surely over-regulation is avoidable.

-Amit Mukherjee

OIL BLOCK AUCTION: WHO GAINS?

Rarely does the prime minister, the finance minister and the planning Commission Deputy Chairman quiz the Petroleum Minister at the same meeting. When the Cabinet met recently, that happened. The issue: award of blocks under the sixth round of the New Exploration Licensing Policy (NELP). The question: will government be able to extract a handsome rent from the contractors in case oil and gas is found? This, since some of the bidding patterns went topsy-turvy this time, compared to the previous NELP rounds. Petroleum Minister Murli Deora prevailed at the Cabinet. But, will the bill register ring loudly for the government? Time alone will tell.

-Balaji Chandramouli

BAN ON WHEAT EXPORT

Behind the ongoing inflation spell lies the vaulting prices of wheat, pulses and edible oils. Not surprisingly the government has banned export of wheat for the entire year. This year, the country has imported as much as 5.5 million tonnes of wheat to mitigate the rising prices.

Government intervention does not end there. It has also effected a 8 per cent hike in the minimum export price of onions. Neglecting food security has proved dear, it appears.

-Balaji Chandramouli

LNG terminal: Fuel is the key

DABHOL LNG ON SALE

If you've got domestic natural gas, the Ratnagiri LNG terminal could be yours. The government is mulling hiving off the LNG terminal of the erstwhile Dabhol power project. The reason: LNG is woefully expensive and unless mixed with cheap domestic gas, the buyer of power from the Ratnagiri power project may not blink. Compounding problems?

-Balaji Chandramouli