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Days before the Assembly elections in five States, the Congress has stepped up the attack on Finance Minister Arun Jaitley over his reported remarks against the Reserve Bank of India. The Opposition believes that if focussed on the “economic mismanagement” of the Centre, its chances in the upcoming polls could be bright.
Senior Congressman and former Minister Anand Sharma said the Centre is trying to destroy autonomous institutions and regulators such as the RBI.
He said Jaitley’s comments on the RBI’s role in “indiscriminate lending” during the UPA’s tenure was a sharp attack on the central bank. “I am surprised by the sharp attack of the Finance Minister on the RBI and its performance. The central bank is independent and autonomous,” Sharma told reporters here on Tuesday.
On Monday, former Finance Minister P Chidambaram had urged the RBI and the Finance Ministry to iron out their differences.
‘Talk face to face’
“Instead of talking to each other through lectures, it might be better if the time-honoured practice of the Finance Minister and the Governor of the RBI of meeting often in private and talking issues is executed. We have done that in the past and it has worked well, why are people delivering lectures across each other I don’t know,” Chidambaram had said.
Sharma added that the government must continue as the spending authority and it should not try to become the monetary authority replacing the RBI.
“It is in the interest of the Indian economy that the RBI alone remains the regulator for the banks, for the lending, for borrowings, and fixes the rates for the banks. Only the RBI must have the powers to regulate the public sector banks and no one else. This government has ignited a fire through its repeated interference from day one and now the government moves to take charge of the monetary policy. It cannot be accepted, it must be opposed,” he said.
“Under Modi and the BJP, they are damaging all the independent institutions of the country responsible for maintaining governance and administration,” he said.
“Jaitley saying that the RBI is not competent, not capable, is the most unfortunate thing. I demand Jaitley to take his words back and apologise for insulting RBI,” Sharma said.
“Therefore we demand from this government to desist from destroying another autonomous institution, to retrace their steps and engage in dialogue and consultations rather than seeking to justify what is wrong,” Sharma added.
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