Even as the Reserve Bank of India expects to hand out new bank licences in a few weeks, Finance Minister P Chidambaram said he had no recommendations for the RBI on the subject.
“I have not seen the Jalan committee report. I have no recommendations for RBI. RBI will take appropriate decisions. At some stage, if the Governor wishes to share his thinking with me, I will be very happy to listen. But I don’t intend to speak”, said Chidambaram.
The Minister was responding to a query on whether he had made any recommendations to the RBI on the matter of debarring applicants who were facing investigations.
As many as 25 applicants are in the fray for new banking licences, which are being awarded after a decade.
With the general election process under way, the central bank will formally seek the Election Commission’s approval for awarding the licences, given that the model code of conduct has come into force.
Outlining the process for finalising the licence awardees, RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan said at a joint press conference with Finance Minister here on Friday that a panel comprising himself and a Deputy Governor was scrutinising the applicants in the light of the Jalan Committee report.
“Once we have done due diligence, we will pass on the recommendations to the committee of the central board. After that, the committee will take a final decision”, Rajan said. In the past two decades, the RBI had given licences to 12 banks in the private sector in two phases.