Speeches & Media Interactions

Interviewers: T. Bijoy Idicheriah and Kalyan Ram from Cogencis. RBI has emerged as the first line of defence against the impact of COVID-19, and some may say, the only line of defence. Do you think more fiscal measures are needed for the relief package to be effective? Also, what is your advice to the government? Should they suspend FRBM or monetise deficit? Fiscal measures are important and the government is working on a package of measures. The finance minister has

Sir I will start with the big picture question. You are back in the day before the RBI became a flexible inflation targeting central bank. Governors would often lay down their priorities in the annual statement which would give us a sense of the current context. Let me go back to that practice and ask you what your current priorities at the institution are given the economic situation: See for the central bank, especially a central bank like the RBI and its multifario

Q1. Governor thus, thank you very much for talking with us. Of course the issue of the day is coronavirus and many discussions around what policymakers might be able to do. Do you agree that there's a case for coordinated central bank action in response? A. That is definitely in a strong reason for coordinated policy action because coronavirus has now turned out to be a global problem so when the problem is a global naturally the need for coordination at coordinated a

It’s been more than a year now for you as RBI Governor, coming after exits of two governors and one deputy governor. How has the year been in terms of RBI-government relationship? For the central bank, it’s never a dull moment, especially in today’s world, and I’m saying so not just in the context of RBI, but for all central banks. Economies across the world are changing so fast, with new technologies, new business models, new challenges. So, the central bank will alw

February 06, 2020 Participants from RBI: Mr. Shaktikanta Das – Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. N. S. Vishwanathan – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. B. P. Kanungo – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. Mahesh Kumar Jain – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Dr. Michael D. Patra – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. T. Rabi Sankar – Executive Director, Reserve Bank of India Shaktikanta Das: Good afternoon. I welcome all the media persons a

The central bank is awaiting the report of a forensic audit into Punjab & Maharashtra Co-operative (PMC) Bank and will have greater clarity on repaying depositors within a few weeks, says RBI governor Shaktikanta Das? It will take a few more quarters to see if signs of growth revival visible now are sustainable, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) governor Shaktikanta Das tells Shritama Bose and Malini Bhupta. The central bank is awaiting the report of a forensic audit in

It is over three years now from when the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) was first constituted. The term of the present MPC will end in 2021. How has been the experience with the MPC? On the whole, the inflation targeting has worked well, in many senses. Number one, it is a committee-based approach, so more minds are going into decision-making. There are three external experts which bring in outside perspective. This definitely improves the quality of decision-making

Q1. Earlier this year you had referred to the Panglossian mood. Has the mood changed? A. Pangloss, if you see the character, was excessively obsessive. When somebody was drowning, he kept on saying this also will be alright. What I had told was that there are challenges, but there is no point in maintaining a mood of gloom and doom. At the same time, I said don’t maintain a Panglossian countenance and do nothing about it. There are challenges. You have to deal with it

December 5, 2019 Participants from RBI: Mr. Shaktikanta Das – Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. N. S. Vishwanathan – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. B.P. Kanungo – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. M. K. Jain – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Dr. Michael D. Patra – Executive Director, Reserve Bank of India Shaktikanta Das: Good morning to everyone. I will first read out my statement after which we will entertain questions and other interve

December 05, 2019 Participants from RBI: Mr. Shaktikanta Das – Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. N. S. Vishwanathan – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. B. P. Kanungo – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. M. K. Jain – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Dr. Michael D. Patra – Executive Director, Reserve Bank of India Mr. Rajeshwar Rao – Executive Director, Reserve Bank of India Ms. Lily Vadera – Executive Director, Reserve Bank of India Mr. T. Rabi

October 4, 2019 Participants from RBI: Mr. Shaktikanta Das – Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. N. S. Vishwanathan – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. B.P. Kanungo – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. M. K. Jain – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Dr. Michael D. Patra – Executive Director, Reserve Bank of India Shaktikanta Das: Good Morning. I will make the usual customary statement in the beginning following which we will have questions and ans

October 4, 2019 Participants from RBI: Shri Shaktikanta Das – Governor, Reserve Bank of India Shri N.S. Vishwanathan – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Shri B. P. Kanungo – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Shri M.K. Jain – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Dr. Michael D. Patra – Executive Director, Reserve Bank of India Shri M. Rajeshwar Rao – Executive Director, Reserve Bank of India Shri Yogesh Dayal – Chief General Manager, Reserve Bank of India Mo

Interviewer: Mythili Bhusnurmath In the last monetary policy review, the MPC and the RBI reduced the GDP estimate marginally to 6.9%. Since then, we have seen that the numbers for the last quarter came in much lower. In hindsight, how would you look at GDP now? The first quarter number came as a surprise. In fact, almost everybody had projected more than that. We had projected 5.8% for Q1 and all others had projected around 5.5%. So, the Q1 GDP number came as a big su

Edited excerpts from the interview. We are meeting at a time when suddenly the global environment is charged up with the explosion at the Aramco oil refinery. Does this disturb your view of the space that monetary policy has? Before commenting specifically on monetary policy, I would like to take a little longer to analyze various consequences and how the situation is playing out in the next few days because this incident happened just a day or two ago. So we should a

August 07, 2019 Participants from RBI: Mr. Shaktikanta Das – Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. N. S. Vishwanathan – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. B.P. Kanungo – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. Mahesh Kumar Jain – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Dr. Michael D. Patra – Executive Director, Reserve Bank of India Mr. Yogesh Dayal – Chief General Manager, Reserve Bank of India Moderator: Good day, ladies and gentlemen. And welcome to the Thi

August 07, 2019 Participants from RBI: Mr. Shaktikanta Das – Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. N. S. Vishwanathan – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. B.P. Kanungo – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. Mahesh Kumar Jain – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Dr. Michael D. Patra- Executive Director, Reserve Bank of India Shaktikanta Das: Good afternoon! I will first make the statement on Part A, that is, the matter covering the resolution of the MPC

Why are policy rate cuts not being transmitted to lending rates at banks? The cost of funds of banks is one of the factors, which impacts lending rates. Banks are gradually recovering from stress in their balance sheets due to overhang of non-performing assets (NPAs). Going forward, I don’t think NPAs will be a major impediment in transmission of the monetary policy rates. Most of the large public sector banks (PSBs) are not under prompt corrective action framework (P

Reserve Bank of India Governor Shaktikanta Das gave his first interview with media since taking office in December. Here’s an edited transcript of the topics he covered in the more than 50 minute interview. On the economic slowdown and the RBI’s response: “The accommodative stance will depend on incoming data. How inflation numbers look how the growth numbers look. Primarily how inflation looks. With regard to the slowdown, I would not give a particular timeline and i

June 06, 2019 Participants from RBI: Mr. Shaktikanta Das – Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. N. S. Vishwanathan – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Dr. Viral V. Acharya – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. B. P. Kanungo – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. Mahesh Kumar Jain – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Dr. Michael D. Patra – Executive Director, Reserve Bank of India Shri Yogesh Dayal – Chief General Manager, Reserve Bank of India Mod

June 06, 2019 Participants from RBI: Mr. Shaktikanta Das – Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. N. S. Vishwanathan – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Dr Viral V. Acharya – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. B.P. Kanungo – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Mr. Mahesh Kumar Jain – Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India Shaktikanta Das: Good afternoon, everyone. I will make my statement. We have already shared the MPC resolution with all of you. I will