The Reserve Bank of India’s Monetary Policy Committee’s first bi-monthly meeting of FY26 is being held from April 7 to 9.
The RBI Governor, Mr Sanjay Malhotra, will hold a press conference on April 9 (Wednesday) after the meeting ends. The MPC is expected to announce is a 25-basis-point repo rate cut.
RBI’s cut in repo rate is expected to shield the Indian economy from the fall-out of the US tariffs on global trade and the expected slowdown this may trigger in the world economy.
In a recent report in businessline, Ram Kumar said the macroeconomic setting, in terms of the retail inflation and GDP growth figures, was “favourable for further deepening the rate cut cycle, which began with a 25-basis-point cut in the repo rate from 6.50 per cent to 6.25 per cent in February”. Click here to read the full article by Ram Kumar.
In a podcast in businessline with Piyush Shukla, Keki Mistry, former Vice Chairman & CEO of HDFC discusses the importance of liquidity management by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), sharing his expectations for future rate cuts. “Personal view is that we will see a rate cut in this April policy,” he notes, highlighting the potential impact of inflation and other factors on India’s economic policy.
Keki Mistry on expectations on rate cuts
Some economists feel amid tariff pressure, 50 bps rate cut by RBI on April 9 can be a good pre-emptive move. They have said upcoming monetary policy meeting is expected to set the tone for how the central bank will respond to the growing concerns in the months ahead.
Where to watch RBI MPC Live: The Live Stream of the RBI Governor, Mr Sanjay Malhotra’s press conference will be available in the businessline website. on April 9.
In this article, Smita Roy Trivedi and Abhiman Das say the sustained rupee depreciation and its inflationary effects may well cast a shadow on MPC’s rate call.
Here, in another article businessline’s Mumbai Bureau says recent data shows that CPI inflation has dropped to a seven-month low of 3.6% in February, falling below the MPC’s target of 4%.