Beyond Financial News

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Two major films – Salman Khan’s Maatrubhumi and Vijay’s Jana Nayagan have been delayed indefinitely over the past few months as political pressures hold off certification and theatrical showcasing, adding to the inventory of unreleased films in India.The former film, previously titled Battle of Galwan, was to have been released in April, and is fighting a China angle as the government softens its stand towards the neighbouring country. Lead actor-turned-politician Vijay’s film was to have been released in January but has faced intense scrutiny and certification issues ahead of assembly elections in Tamil Nadu.Such delays for films have been seen earlier, adding to costs and expenses, disrupting OTT showcasing, and even having to be majorly re-edited or not released at all.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Bengaluru: In a Mumbai apartment, Abhishek Sarkate spends his days staring at a glowing screen. As a video editor working remotely, his world rarely extends beyond his desk. A while back, when he tried outsourcing his food, ordering in or eating out, his gut rebelled.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.BENGALURU: Urban Company Ltd plans to launch an air-conditioner-cum-air purifier ahead of Diwali this year, according to two people with direct knowledge of the matter, as the quick-services platform expands beyond its home and beauty services business and deepens its presence in its consumer durables vertical.Urban Company entered the consumer durables segment in October 2023 with the launch of its Native brand, starting with water purifiers. Since then, the company has added electronic door locks and is now looking to scale up with air-conditioner-cum air purifiers.“Urban Company can only make so much profit from its services business because that depends heavily on manpower and day-to-day operations.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.The Federal Reserve succession drama now comes down to a decision only Jerome Powell can make.The Justice Department said on Friday it would halt its criminal investigation of the Fed chair. Initial ambiguity about whether the probe was truly over kept the path uncertain through the weekend.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.BENGALURU: India’s café chains are moving beyond traditional coffee-led formats and experimenting with dessert-focused concepts, hybrid cafés and experience-led stores to drive higher engagement and spending.Last week, Westbridge Capital-backed Third Wave Coffee launched “Third Rush” at four of its outlets in Bengaluru, branding and positioning desserts as a standalone experience aimed at enhancing late-evening socializing.“We see desserts evolving into a strategic lever that supports higher engagement and ticket size,” Rajat Luthra, chief executive officer (CEO) of Third Wave Coffee, told Mint.Barista Coffee recently started diner-style outlets that offer a more expansive set of meal items like burgers and pastas and hybrid cafés that serve coffee and food items, while Tata Starbucks already has desserts as part of its food menu and is expanding a mix of neighbourhood stores and more immersive Reserve formats.These formats are becoming more specialized. Dessert-led menus and artisanal bakery tie-ups are helping chains move beyond beverages into full-stack consumption.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Iran, China and an array of middlemen have evaded U.S. sanctions for years by shipping oil on aging tankers with opaque records and transferring cargoes between ships at sea, all to avoid scrutiny and legal liability.U.S.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.NEW DELHI: South Korean tech companies Krafton Inc. and Naver Corp.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.India’s equity market is undergoing a quiet but meaningful structural shift, where market leadership is steadily widening beyond traditional heavyweight conglomerates. While large business groups continue to dominate in absolute terms, their grip on overall market capitalization is loosening as gains spread across sectors, mid-sized firms and new-age businesses.A Mint analysis of 10 leading business groups by market capitalization shows their combined share in India’s total market value has steadily declined over the past few years—from 31.4% in FY22 to 25.3% in FY25 and further to 24% in FY26.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.If Vedanta’s challenge to lenders’ approval of Adani Enterprises’ ₹15,000-crore resolution plan for Jaiprakash Associates Ltd (JAL) succeeds, it could redefine lenders’ wide powers under the “commercial wisdom” doctrine in the country’s bankruptcy regulation, lawyers said.Lawyers say the Anil Agarwal-led Vedanta's challenge is serious and, if successful, could force lenders to better explain their decisions, especially when choosing a lower-value plan based on factors like upfront cash and faster payments.“If Vedanta succeeds, the case would represent a reconsideration of the commercial wisdom doctrine,” said V. Aneesh, partner at CMS IndusLaw.Vedanta is challenging the committee of creditors' (CoC) approval for Adani’s plan before the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT), saying its higher bid was unfairly rejected."Commercial wisdom” is a court-developed legal principle, not expressly defined in the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC).

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Quick commerce is evolving beyond a distribution channel into a testing ground for product innovation, enabling brands—from new-age to legacy players, across categories from milk to makeup—to launch, refine and scale offerings.The appeal lies in the cost advantage over traditional rollouts, particularly for smaller brands that can test in small batches, track repeat purchases and tweak products in real time.“Rather than spending ₹10 crore on a big-bang launch, brands can test with ₹20-30 lakh and see what works,” said Sashi Kumar of organic dairy enterprise Akshayakalpa Organic.The Bengaluru-based firm launched its high-protein milk exclusively on Swiggy to validate demand. “The expectation was not volumes, but whether consumers come back and buy again,” Kumar said, adding that the channel removes hurdles like listing fees and in-store promotions, while offering sharper targeting and faster feedback.Strong repeat rates helped Akshayakalpa, whose quick-commerce business is growing about 40% year-on-year, to scale the product offline.Beyond staples, the model is also gaining traction in seasonal and impulse-driven categories.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Facing a gas supply squeeze amid the West Asia war, India is considering a steep increase in blending compressed biogas (CBG) into city gas networks—potentially up to 20%—in a phased manner to reduce import dependence and cushion supplies, said two people aware of the discussions.The blending mandate for city gas distribution (CGD) entities was 1% as of fiscal year 2026 (FY26), to be gradually increased to 3%, 4% and 5% in FY27, FY28 and FY29, respectively. The government is now considering enhancing this to well beyond 5% and with a much more stringent timeline.This underscores a policy shift towards scaling domestic CBG output, as India prioritizes essential gas use and looks to ease pressure on liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports.Natural gas is processed to produce piped natural gas (PNG) and compressed natural gas (CNG) as fuels for cooking and mobility, respectively.Government is pushing for a higher adoption of piped or city gas by domestic as well as industrial users due to the acute shortage of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), the more commonly used cooking fuel.The government's focus on compressed biogas is gaining momentum amid the energy supply crunch due to the West Asia war, with India depending on the region for 40% of its natural gas imports.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.NEW DELHI: Earning ₹12 lakh and paying zero tax is no longer the ceiling under the new regime. With the right salary structure and employer-backed benefits, even professionals earning ₹15 lakh, or more, can reduce their taxable income to zero.That shift marks a break from the old regime, where tax planning revolved around deductions such as house rent allowance (HRA), leave travel allowance (LTA), home loan interest and Section 80C investments.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.MUMBAI: A new class of high-ticket investment products, positioned for higher-risk investors, is drawing participation from cities beyond the top 30, early data shows.SIFs, introduced by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) in February 2025, were pitched as products for investors with a higher risk appetite than mutual funds, with a minimum ticket size of ₹10 lakh.About 53% of investors in Specialised Investment Funds (SIF) are from beyond the top 30 cities, or B30 locations, according to an analysis by Computer Age Management Services (CAMS). These regions account for roughly 33% of total SIF assets.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.If you thought the old vs new tax regime debate was settled, think again.Just when the government seemed determined to push taxpayers toward the new regime, the newly notified Income Tax Rules, 2026 have quietly reopened the contest. By increasing limits for several exemptions, the old regime has regained relevance.And now, as a salaried individual, you are back to doing what you hoped was over: choosing.Every April, employers ask for investment declarations.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.On warm evenings in Delhi, bartenders are swapping vodka and gin for jamun (java plum), kaccha aam (raw mango) and chilli mango, signalling India's palate is expanding beyond plain white spirits.This shift is beginning to reshape how alcohol producers such as Diageo Plc, Allied Blenders and Distillers Ltd, Radico Khaitan Ltd and NV Group approach their white spirits portfolios, as the country now stands as the fourth-largest flavoured spirits market globally by value, according to industry estimates.Driven by younger consumers, at-home drinking and cocktail culture, India is catching on to a global trend in which flavoured spirits account for a significant share of consumption, but with a twist: it is instead drawing from local kitchens, street snacks and seasonal fruits rather than traditional profiles such as citrus or berry.Kunal Madan, chief marketing officer of Radico Khaitan, which makes Magic Moments vodka, told Mint that its flavoured spirits portfolio is driving 60% of vodka volume growth. Magic Moments also reported around 18% volume growth in the third quarter and sales of ₹1,050 crore for the nine months ended 31 December, driven by flavour-led innovations.In September 2025, it launched Magic Moments vodka in the ‘Jamun SpicyMint’ flavour.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.The Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) discussion paper, ‘Exploring Safeguards in Digital Payments to Curb Frauds,’ is part of its ongoing efforts to make digital payments safer and fraud-proof to the extent possible. Given the rapid growth of online transfers, it was but inevitable that frauds would also increase manifold.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.After building a ₹1,000-crore FMCG business on ghee over four decades, GRB Dairy Foods Pvt. Ltd.

Democracy is inherently fraught. At its core lies the difficulty of translating individual preferences into a coherent social choice, a problem famously captured by Nobel laureate economist Kenneth Arrow’s impossibility theorem and later developed by another Nobel laureate Amartya Sen in his 1970 book Collective Choice and Social Welfare.

Strait of Hormuz.The nuclear question is the oldest and most fundamental source of Western suspicion. Iran insists it has never sought to build a bomb.

₹1 trillion or more are proposed to be included in the list replacing an earlier methodology of quantitative and qualitative parameters. Upper layer non-banks face tighter regulations than smaller ones.A list of all NBFCs for fiscal 2026 released by the Reserve Bank of India on Friday included the name of Tata Sons among others in the upper layer.

The US-Iran ceasefire, framed as a two-week conditional truce, offers relief but is less of a resolution than a pause in a fast-escalating crisis. It follows nearly 40 days of sustained US-Israeli military pressure on Iran, itself an extension of the unresolved tensions that persisted after the 2025 Iran-Israel confrontation. In that sense, this ceasefire is simply a momentary recalibration in a longer strategic contest.At its core, the arrangement reflects a transactional bargain.