Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday shared with G20 Finance Ministers the policy measures undertaken by the Government and RBI to support the poor, vulnerable and various sectors of the Indian economy to tide over the COVID-19 induced crisis.

Participating in the virtual session of the 2nd G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors meeting under Saudi Arabian presidency today, Sitharaman said that so far within a couple of weeks INDIA has disbursed financial assistance amounting to $ 3.9 billion to more than 320 million, with a special focus on direct benefit transfer through digital technology so that the exposure of beneficiaries to public places is minimised.

India is now reaping the benefits of the far-sighted measures of financial inclusion reforms, she added.

She also said that the monetary policy measures taken by the government, the RBI and other regulators have helped de-freeze the market and catalyse credit flows.

These measures include liquidity support of $50 billion, regulatory and supervisory measures for credit rating, relief in debt servicing through moratoriums in instalments of term loans, eased working capital financing and deferred interest payments on such financing.

She also said that that the G20 action plan — prepared by G20 members on the directions of G20 leaders — lays the foundations to “our individual and collective actions to fight the Covid-19 pandemic”.

Sitharaman expressed hope that the global community would soon overcome the Covid-19 crisis and that the lessons learnt would enable the G20 develop prudent policy measures to combat any such crisis in the future.

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