Reacting to the monetary policy review by the Reserve Bank of India on Tuesday, Assocham said here that industry was disappointed with the key policy rates being unchanged.

“This move will definitely slow down the growth momentum even further,” said Mr D.S. Rawat, National Secretary-General of The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (Assocham), in Ahmedabad.

Continuation of the RBI’s ‘hawkish’ policy stance to rein in high inflation is not the right step in the current scenario of falling growth rates, he said. “However, it has put further pressure on the Government to implement long-pending reforms and mend its policy on fiscal consolidation.”

SLR reduction by 100 bps is a positive move to free liquidity given concerns surrounding high-cost lending continuing to affect fresh investments, Mr Rawat said.

'A missed opportunity'

"It is a missed opportunity to revive the growth momentum in the economy," said Mr Chandrajit Banerjee, Director-General, Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), adding that CII welcomed the SLR cut to 23 per cent.

RBI has lowered the growth forecast from 7.3 per cent to 6.5 per cent for 2012-13 in its first quarter review of the monetary policy 2012-13. The chambers were gunning for a repo rate cut of 200 basis points and CRR by 100 basis points to induce investments.

Mr Sandip Somany, President, PHD Chamber of Commerce & Industry, said the tight monetary stance of the RBI has weighed on the investment scenario and corporate investments have dipped considerably from 14 per cent of GDP during 2004-07 to around 10 per cent of GDP in recent years.

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