Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Shaktikanta Das on Wednesday said that the economy of the country, which has been damaged by the COVID-19 pandemic, is at the doorstep of a revival process.
Das made the comments while delivering a speech at the launch of the book ‘Portraits of Power: Half a Century of Being at Ringside’, written by former bureaucrat and current chairman of the finance commission N K Singh. He said, “we are almost at the doorstep of revival process and it’s very important that the financial entities have adequate capital (to support growth).”
Das added said that the fiscal measures taken by the government to deal with the pandemic have so far been well calibrated and prudent.
“The Central government has provided prudent measures to provide financial support to the weaker sections and small businesses,” he said.
He further said that the central bank has asked all the banks and NBFCs to undertake stress test internally.
Asked if there is symmetry between the fiscal and monetary policy, Das said both are in an accommodative stance.
“Both policies are working in close symmetry. In fact, both fiscal and monetary policies are today at the moment counter-cyclical.
“The government has undertaken several measures in very, very prudent and well calibrated measure in the context of the pandemic. First, to provide financial support to the vulnerable sections of the society and then provide certain kinds of relief to the other segments like industry and business,” he said.
As far as the central bank is concerned, the Governor said “we are already in a monetary expansion mode. In fact, we have deployed several instruments and tools which were not in the toolkit of the RBI.”