India's Maruti profit triples

In this file photo taken on Jan. 5, 2010, Maruti Suzuki Chief Executive Officer Shinzo Nakanishi, second left, poses with officials at the unveiling of the Maruti Suzuki rIII concept car at an Auto Expo in New Delhi, India. –AP

NEW DELHI: India's biggest carmaker Maruti Suzuki said Saturday its quarterly net profit more than tripled as it announced plans to increase capacity to maintain its dominance of the domestic market.
Maruti, majority owned by Japan's Suzuki Motor Corp, said net profit during the fiscal third quarter soared to 6.88 billion rupees (149 million dollars) from 2.14 billion rupees a year earlier.
The performance, fuelled by cheap loans and a reviving domestic economy, beat analyst expectations that profit for the three months to December would be around 5.8 billion rupees.
“This has been a good quarter,” said Maruti's chief financial officer Ajay Seth, as he announced the company would expand capacity to defend its market leadership position from global rivals and meet increasing domestic demand.
A host of vehicle makers from General Motors to Renault and Toyota have unveiled plans for car launches in India to grab a larger slice of the fast-growing market and counter sluggish demand in developed countries.
India is now Asia's third-largest car market, outstripped only by China and Japan, and is one of the few countries where automobile sales are rapidly increasing. Car sales jumped 19 percent last year to 1.43 million units.
Maruti, which sells about one in two cars in the country, said sales jumped 62.5 per cent to 73.34 billion rupees.
Seth said Maruti planned to invest 17 billion rupees to make 250,000 more cars each year from April 2012, increasing total capacity from one million units.
The expansion would take place at Maruti's plant at Manesar near the Indian capital.
Seth said Maruti could further ramp up capacity “if there is a need later.” The car manufacturer attributed the profit increase partly to government stimulus measures aimed at helping the industry ride out the global economic slump.
The measures have put more money into the hands of India's growing middle class.
“Favourable conditions in the domestic market supported by the government's stimulus package and ease of automobile finance helped achieve good sales,” the company said in a statement.
Nearly four-fifths of cars in India are bought using loans.
The central bank has cut interest rates to record lows to cushion the impact of international financial slump.
Maruti's domestic sales in the quarter jumped by 38 per cent to 218,910 units while exports soared by 167 per cent to 39,116 vehicles, spurred by European government incentives to scrap ageing vehicles.
Seth said the company was “cautiously optimistic” about sales volumes in the fourth quarter but added rising commodity prices would put pressure on profit margins.
“We also have to keep in mind interest rates may rise (as the domestic economy recovers) and it is important that government incentive measures stay in place” to help keep the market buoyant, he told AFP.
Passenger car sales are forecast to reach two million this year and are expected to triple in the next decade, boosted by higher incomes in the country of 1.2 billion people, according to industry estimates. –AFP

Saudi schoolgirl sentenced to 90 lashes after assaulting headmistress

(CNN) -- A schoolgirl in Saudi Arabia was sentenced to 90 lashes and two months in prison for assaulting her headmistress after a confrontation over a cell phone, sparking an outcry from a government-sponsored rights group.
Saudi Arabia's National Society for Human Rights said it is surprised by the verdict and called for the punishment be reconsidered, according to statement by the group.
The verdict was handed down by a court in the eastern province city of Jubail as a punishment for the 13-year-old who allegedly assaulted her headmistress.
Saudi daily newspaper, Al-Watan, which first reported the sentence, said the girl struck the headmistress on the head with a glass after a confrontation over the confiscation of the girl's camera-equipped cell phone.
Dr. Saleh Al-Khaslan, a spokesman for the rights group, said the penalty was too severe.
"The court should have looked for an alternative sentence," he said, adding that the rights group is calling on an appeals court in Jubail to hear the case again.
Al-Watan did not provide the name of the school, its headmistress or the girl. Efforts to reach the Saudi Ministry of Justice were unsuccessful.
Saudi Arabia follows a strict interpretation of Islam called Wahhabism, and lashings are a common form of punishment.
In October 2009, a court sentenced a man to five years in prison and 1,000 lashes after he bragged about his sex life on television.
In March of the same year, a Saudi court sentenced a 75-year-old Syrian woman to 40 lashes, four months imprisonment and deportation from the kingdom for having two unrelated men in her house.
In 2007, a 19-year-old gang-rape victim in the Saudi city of Qatif was sentenced to 200 lashes and six months in prison for meeting with an unrelated male. The seven attackers, who abducted the man and woman, got sentences ranging from 10 months to five years in prison. The case sparked international outrage, prompting Saudi's King Abdullah to pardon the girl and the unrelated male.

'Mass Effect 2' kicks off big 2010 for gamers

"Battlefield: Bad Company 2" is one of many anticipated games coming in early 2010.(CNN) -- OK, so you've exhausted most of those video games you got for Christmas. And you've got a gift card or two burning a hole in your pocket.
You need some new games for the new year. And 2010 is only too happy to oblige.
Gaming companies are releasing enough popular titles in the first three months of the year to fill a shelf in your entertainment center. Between much-anticipated sequels and intriguing new titles, it's enough to make your controller quiver with anticipation.
Here's our preview:
The big title for January is the follow-up to a smash hit, but it isn't just an ordinary sequel. "Mass Effect 2" (BioWare, Electronic Arts) takes your character from the original futuristic game -- complete with all their experiences and relationships -- and puts them into the darker, second chapter of what is a planned trilogy.
The game's urgent mission to stop a deadly plague offers new challenges, different enemies and more realistic graphics than the first. The early trailers to "ME2" feel like scenes from a blockbuster movie. The dialogue choices are also improved to allow more flexibility when interacting with your team or other characters.
"Mass Effect 2" comes out January 26 for the Xbox 360 and PC. It is rated M for mature (blood, drug reference, sexual content, strong language, violence).
February offers a selection of original titles, a long-awaited online RPG and a major sequel.
"Star Trek" fans will get their opportunity to live out their Trekkie dreams -- virtually, at least -- with the release of "Star Trek Online" (Atari, Cryptic Studios). Players can choose or create their own race, pick a career path and start blasting away at Borg. Combat can take place during ground-based missions or in the cold, vast reaches of space.
"Star Trek Online" will be released on February 2 for the PC and is rated T for teens (fantasy violence, mildly suggestive themes).
The month then goes to hell with the release of "Dante's Inferno" (Visceral Games, Electronic Arts). Players follow Dante as he travels through the nine circles of Hell, faces off against the Seven Deadly Sins and generally creates havoc in the underworld.
An upgradable weapons system allows gamers to tailor Dante's abilities to holy or unholy gameplay. Each of the nine circles will have its own distinct look, taken directly from Dante Alighieri's epic poem.
"Dante's Inferno" is due out February 9 for the Xbox 360, PS3 and PSP. It is rated M for mature (blood and gore, intense violence, nudity, sexual content).
"Aliens vs. Predator" keeps the monsters from the popular movies but ditches any story relationship by going 30 years into the future after "Aliens 3." This first-person shooter lets you play as a Marine, one of the aliens or as the Predator. Each has its own special combat advantages (the spiky tail of the Alien should be a sneaky, impaling-type weapon) and all are particularly vicious and gory.
Once you've mastered the game play, feel free to jump into the multiplayer action for bullet vs. fang vs. claw combat. "AvP" is set for release on February 26 for the PS3, PC and Xbox 360. It is rated (you guessed it) M for mature.
"Heavy Rain" (Sony, Quantic Dream) should be one of the more interesting games of early 2010. It looks like a film noir thriller with gritty visuals and moody atmospherics. The gameplay, however, is heavy on contextual actions by the gamer, allowing for more story flexibility and a greater sense of overall destiny control.
Developers say the story changes based on the player's actions and every decision will have a tangible effect on the characters and their destinies. You play as one of four characters throughout the game and can even kill off one of the others and still have a conclusion to the story. "Heavy Rain" is scheduled for release on February 23 as a PS3 exclusive.
Finally, "BioShock 2" (2K Games, 2K Marin) takes the player 10 years into the future after the first game, drops you into the role of a previous bad guy, then throws you into the ocean deep to fend off a new nemesis. The early gameplay looks as fabulous as the original, promising a continuation of the rich story and the chance to explore more of the underwater Rapture city. "BioShock 2" will be out on February 9 for the Xbox 360, PC and PS3.
Gaming in March is going to be bloody with a dash of godly rage being released in the middle of the month.
Gamers are always ready for the next good war game and "Battlefield: Bad Company 2" (DICE, Electronic Arts) is promising to deliver. With destructible environments, more than 15 vehicles and flying machines and an open-world perspective, "BF: BC2" gives gamers the chance to destroy and conquer just about everything on the map.
The game is designed to work best in squad form, so multiplayer will likely be the most enjoyable way to play (and online will be even better). An EA representative said that in a recent closed beta test, "BF: BC2" saw more than 300,000 players rack up 45 million kills, 9.4 million kills from vehicles, 3.43 million vehicles destroyed and over 380,000 buildings destroyed. That's a lot of mayhem. The game will be out on March 2 for the Xbox 360, PS3 and PC.
The most anticipated game in 2010 erupts in mid-March as Kratos returns to battle the gods of Olympus in "God of War 3" (Sony). While the story might sound similar to the other releases in the ancient trilogy, Sony is promising a new game engine and updated visuals to give players the realistic feel of actually being in battle.
A recent demo showed Kratos slicing and dicing his way through harpies and zombies before carving up a chimera and taking down Helios, the Greek god of the Sun. Because this is the last of the trilogy, players should expect storylines to be finished up in glorious, bloody fashion. "God of War 3" is due on March 19 as a PS3 exclusive.
And that's not all. Plenty of other upcoming games, including "Final Fantasy XIII," "Army of Two: The 40th Day," and "Dark Void," will also be vying for your console and computer time in the next three months. More major releases are planned during the rest of what is expected to be a huge year for gaming.
Did we miss anything? What games are you most looking forward to? Tell us in the comments below