Gurgaon girl slits wrist,jumps off third floor of city mall

A 22-year-old girl jumped off the third floor of Sahara Mall on MG Road on Sunday afternoon. The police said that she had climbed the third floor without informing anyone and that she had slit her left wrist before jumping from the mall.

The victim has been identified as Kanika, who was living with her family in Palam Vihar. The police said that she was working as a receptionist with a BPO in Udyog Vihar.

The incident took place around 1 pm when the girl had climbed the staircase near the fire exit.

Shop owners at the mall said that these stairs were rarely used by visitors and were on the side of the parking area. The girl jumped off the window, eyewitnesses said.

Shivaji Rajesh, a security guard, who was on the ground when Kanika jumped off, said, I shouted and asked her what she was up to since I knew it was dangerous to be there. But she did not listen to me. She jumped and fell on the ground injuring herself.

She was rushed to the nearest hospital by the officials of the mall and was then referred to Paras Hospital.

A senior executive of the malls management group said, The girl had two mobile phones. After taking her to the hospital, we contacted her family members.

He said that they have recovered a blade from the spot, which Kanika might have used to slit her left wrist.

The 22-year-old is now admitted in the ICU. Doctors said that she has multiple injuries on her head, chest and other parts of the body.

The reason behind her suicide attempt was not known till the time of filing this report.

Red Fort Capital investing Rs 200cr in Ansal Properties JV

Real estate private equity firm Red Fort Capital is picking an undisclosed stake in a joint venture with Delhi-based Ansal Properties & Infrastructure Ltd for Rs 200 crore. The JV will undertake expansion of a residential project in Gurgaon by developing an additional 108-acre township project adjacent to Ansal’s existing 112-acre Esencia township project in Gurgaon.

Earlier, newsagency PTI had reported quoting unnamed sources that Ansal Properties is looking to raise Rs 350 crore from a bunch of private equity firms for financing some of its projects.

Ansal Properties last June raised Rs 58 crore ($12 million) through a preferential allotment to a string of high net worth individuals besides financial services firm Enam Investment Services. This was part of the plans to dilute 4.5% stake for around Rs 70 crore. Bulk of the investments has been made by three Mumbai-based individuals Roopchand Bhanshali, Akash Bhanshali and Sushma Jain. Enam invested around Rs 8 crore. The fifth investor Sudarshan Securities is likely to pitch in with the balance Rs 12 crore.

For Red Fort this transaction comes as the third deal in last five months. It had picked 24.5% stake in an upcoming office complex project being built by another Delhi-based realty firm Parsvnath Developers Ltd in the capital city’s central business district Connaught Place for Rs 120 crore in October.

In another back to back deal announced last November, Red Fort Capital had formed yet another venture with Parsvnath Developers jointly bidding to develop 5 million sq.ft. residential and mixed-use project on a 38-acre parcel near Connaught Place. This project was secured from India’s Rail Land Development Authority for $360 million.

This were not the first time the two were forming a partnership. The public listed realty company that had also raised Rs 270 crore separately through a qualified institutional placement of shares in October, had also raised a total of Rs 115 crore from Red Fort for 22% stake in Parsvnath La Tropicana, a group housing project of the company in north Delhi.

Indian realty sector has been on a recovery path after seeing the asset price bubble burst in 2008 with credit squeeze and high interest rates. Although the revival was led by rising demand for residential housing projects, commercial realty has seen an uptick for the last six months.

Although slow expansion in the retail sector has held back any sharp momentum to revenue growth, given wide expectations of the upcoming Union Budget opening the retail sector to foreign investment it could come as a positive push for retail realty space.

Shivraj Puri's judicial custody extended

A local court on Friday extended the judicial custody of Shivraj Puri, the alleged mastermind of the Rs 400 crore Citibank fraud, and co-accused Sanjay Gupta, till February 25. The two are currently lodged in the Bhondsi jail.

Chief judicial magistrate D N Bhardwaj extended the custody by 14 days. He announced the extension using the video conferencing facility at the hearing.

Puri, a relationship manager employed with Citibank's Gurgaon branch, allegedly duped high networth individuals (HNIs) and corporates by collecting funds from them on a promise of unusually high returns.

Gupta allegedly arranged funds for Puri and in lieu got commission of Rs 20 crore. A multi-pronged probe involving the police, banking regulator RBI and capital markets watchdog Sebi is currently underway in the fraud case.

Shivraj Puris father also tried to get an anticipatory bail from the Punjab and Haryana High Court. The case is pending in the HC. Earlier, a city court had rejected the anticipatory bail of Puris mother Diksha Puri.

Alpha G:Corp to build Rs 400-cr Gurgaon township

Realty firm Alpha G:Corp today said it would develop a group housing project in Gurgaon at an investment of Rs 400 crore.

The company would build 670 housing units on a 12.5 acre land, which is owned by Magnum International.

"The project cost is Rs 400 crore including land cost," company's Director and CEO S K Sayal told reporters.

The investment would be largely met through bank debt and advances from customers, he added.

Alpha G:Corp, which is 60 per cent owned by foreign investors including Morgan Stanley, will soon launch this project at an inaugural rate of Rs 3,400 per sq ft, but the company is looking at a realisation of over Rs 3,800 per sq ft from this project.

Morgan Stanley has 14 per cent stake in the company. Alpha G:Corp's completed developments and upcoming projects encompass an area of more than 40 million sq ft.

The company's business model entails undertaking of projects through acquisition, joint venture development and real estate asset management.

Apart from national capital region (NCR), Alpha G:Corp is developing projects in Punjab, Haryana and Gujarat.

Vineet Gill, TNN, Feb 1, 2011, 06.08am IST

Even though the NCR water plan meant for providing immediate relief to the water woes of old Gurgaon was conceived three years back, MCG has no action so far.

The blueprints and the budget for the project were readied by the public health department of Gurgaon. But when the proposal was sent to the state government, it was instantly vetoed, and the public health department was instructed to pass over the project details and plans to the then newly-formed municipal corporation.

But it has been more than three years since the MCG has been sitting on this project, which seems to have been shelved indefinitely.

A senior official of the public health department said that they were told categorically by the state government to pass the ready details and budget sheets to the MCG in 2009.

If the project was granted, it would have taken us three years for completion, he said. But because the government rejected public health departments proposal, this plan has appears to have been pigeonholed under the MCG.

The existing water supply lines in old Gurgaon were laid around 35 years back, and all these lines still lie in the same disorderly and haphazard way. Our plan was to replace the lines. Remove the existing ones which are now outdated, and set up new pipelines instead, said the official.

Water supply lines in the old town are all currently composed of PVC, a material which is not even officially prescribed anymore. According to the norms, the pipelines have to be cast iron or ductile iron for better longevity, and our water project was supposed to focus on removing all PVC pipelines in old Gurgaon, said the official.

The other main points of the project were regarding the widening of the water pipes. The population of old Gurgaon has massively increased in the last decade or so, and the demand for water has also gone up, said the executive engineer of the public health department, Pradeep Kumar. He said that widening of the pipes would have made sure that a better quantity of water is supplied to these areas. There is about 450 kilometre of pipelines all over old Gurgaon, and the whole network requires attention and a large amount of work, said Kumar. Officials of the municipal corporation were not available for comment.

Forget cards, now shop all you want using your cellphone

Airtel subscribers in the city no longer need to fumble through their wallets for their credit or debit cards to make a payment. Paying for a transaction is now as simple as dialing a number from your mobile. For, the telecom giant has chosen Gurgaon as th31CELL.TIMin India for the launch of Airtel Money, a mobile wallet service.

The service, which was launched in Gurgaon on Monday, enables a consumer to pay their utility bills, recharge their accounts, shop, book tickets and even pay for their groceries.

Airtel Money will subsequently be launched in Delhi-NCR and other cities in India in a phased manner.

Announcing the launch of the service, Atul Bindal, president, mobile services, said, Airtel Money transforms the mobile phone into a secure and convenient wallet, in which customers can load money and use it for shopping and making payments. We are sure that this service will bring about a paradigm shift in the way consumers transact in India.

Airtel was granted the license to use the semi-closed wallet by the Reserve Bank of India in 2010, Bindal added.

In Gurgaon, the telecom company has already established partnerships with several merchants (including coffee shops, restaurants etc) to accept payments via Airtel Money. This partnership would gradually be scaled up to over 3,000 merchants across the city, said a spokesperson.

A maximum daily limit of Rs 5,000 has been fixed for transactions via Airtel Money. Subscribers can recharge their Airtel Money account just the way they recharge their pre-paid cards by visiting the nearest dealer.

While new Airtel connections will be available with pre-loaded Airtel Money services, existing subscribers can register themselves by filling an application form along with proofs of identity and residence.

For making payments through mobile, sunscribers need to go to the Airtel Money application on their SIM card and select the merchant to which they want to make the payment. All transactions (payments, account enquiry etc.) would need to be authorized by entering a four-digit password.