12 July

Jewellers decided to suspend Sale of Gold Coins for Six Months

Prominent jewellery retailers and bullion traders across India on 10 July 2013 decided to suspend sale of gold coins and bars for six months. The decision will help the government in curbing gold imports and keep the current account deficit under control.

Prominent players including TBZ, Gitanjali and Tanishq, will stop selling gold coins. Coins and bars account for more than a third of gold sales in India. India is the world's largest gold buyer, at 860 tonnes a year. The demand for coins and bars increased 150 percent in the last four years.
Although the government had adopted several measures to control sales, the impact has been slow. Demand for gold jewellery in the last 10 years has remained constant. But investment demand has increased several times.

Zubin Mehta to receive Tagore award for cultural harmony

  The second Tagore Award for Cultural Harmony would be conferred on music maestro Zubin Mehta.

A high-level jury under the chairmanship of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and consisting of the Chief Justice of India Altamas Kabir, leader of opposition in Lok Sabha, Sushma Swaraj and public intellectual Gopalkrishna Gandhi after detailed discussions on July 4 unanimously decided to select Mehta to be the recipient of the Tagore Award, 2013, in recognition of his outstanding contribution to cultural harmony.

The annual award was instituted during the commemoration of 150th birth anniversary of Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore. The first Tagore Award was conferred on Ravi Shankar, the Indian sitar maestro, last year. The award carries an amount of Rs 1 crore, a citation in a scroll, a plaque as well as an exquisite traditional handicraft/handloom item.