By Krishna V Kurup
(Reuters) - Tata Steel Ltd was helped to a quarterly profit of 146.88 billion rupees ($2.17 billion) by a one-off pensions gain, in contrast with an 11.68 billion rupee loss a year earlier.
The Indian steelmaker on Wednesday reported an exceptional gain of 113.76 billion rupees in the quarter to the end of March, which included a non-cash gain of 140.77 billion rupees relating to the restructuring of its British pension scheme.
Britain's pensions regulator agreed last year to allow Tata Steel UK to cut pension scheme liabilities, the main stumbling block in Tata's efforts to merge its European operations with Germany's Thyssenkrupp.
In the same quarter last year, Tata Steel booked charges of 40.69 billion rupees, including curtailment charges relating to the closure of Tata Steel Europe's pension scheme.
Income from operations in the quarter rose by 2.6 percent to 357.37 billion rupees, the company said in a statement. It also reported a decline of about 5.9 percent in total steel deliveries for the fourth quarter, while domestic deliveries slipped 5.6 percent to 3.03 million tonnes.
Tata Steel shares were 0.8 percent lower ahead of its results on Wednesday.
($1 = 67.7925 Indian rupees)
(Reporting by Krishna V Kurup in Bengaluru; editing by Jason Neely and Alexander Smith)
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