In his second letter to Modi within a fortnight, Swamy alleged that despite holding a sensitive and very high government post, Rajan has been making mandatory trips to the United States to renew his Green Card. “We have also embarked on a cleanup of bad debts in the banking system so as to free bank balance sheets to support growth”, he said at the SAARCFINANCE Governors’ Symposium. After Swamy was nominated back to the Rajya Sabha earlier this year, Congress members in the House chanted “CIA agent”, pointing to him.
Advertisement
Swamy said Rajan’s insistence on high interest rate led to recession in the domestic small and medium industries causing not only sharp decline in output but also massive unemployment of semi-skilled labour.
Furthermore, he said Rajan was also a member of the Group of 30, which is dominated by the US.
Swamy reiterates his claim that Rajan continues to hold an American Green Card, suggesting he might not have a “patriotic and unconditional commitment to our nation”.
Accusing the RBI governor of sending “confidential and sensitive financial information to various persons around the world on his University of Chicago unsecure personal email address”, which he said is a “reckless disregard of the national security interests of India”.
Rajan later said he wasn’t denigrating India’s success with the comment, and called for an improved public dialogue in which remarks are kept in context.
According to Rajan, while the eyes of the world have been on the much anticipated Goods and Services Tax (GST) reform, a number of other significant reforms have taken place, including the recent passage of the new Bankruptcy bill, which is likely to speed the resolution of distress tremendously. Besides, the RBI has been talking about sustainable growth trajectory, rather than infusing a bubble into an over-leveraged economy, the chamber said. “But I don’t think we should allow a public discourse where instead of a debate on issues, we concentrate on a debate on persons”, he told NDTV.
Swamy said the BJP asked him to find a way to get the opposition Congress party, which is controlled by the Gandhi family, to stop blocking reforms in parliament.
For a party known to have a strong leadership, whether it is Shah or Modi, and a fairly strong messaging approach, the fact that Swamy feels empowered to continue throwing muck at the RBI Governor without anyone rebuking him sends a message of its own.
Advertisement
The RBI governor stressed that there is no substitute for good policy and said that the government and the RBI had contained inflation through a combination of better food management, a new inflation framework and calibrated monetary policies and, of course, the good luck of lower energy prices.
