Shaktikanta Das reappointed as RBI governor

New Delhi: On Friday Shaktikanta Das was reappointed as Reserve Bank of India (RBI) governor for three more years, till December 2024.

The cabinet appointments committee comprising Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah. took the decision was taken last evening.

“The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet has approved the reappointment of Shaktikanta Das as RBI Governor for a period of three years beyond December 10, 2021 or until further orders, whichever is earlier,” read an official statement.

Das took over as RBI Governor in December 2018, for three years. He was previously the Economic Affairs Secretary at the Finance Ministry. He is the first RBI Governor to get an extension under the current BJP government; earlier ones either resigned or decided to go back to academics. He has held important positions in finance, taxation, industries and infrastructure.

Mr Das has also served as India’s Alternate Governor in the World Bank, Asian Development Bank (ADB), New Development Bank (NDB) and Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).

During his long tenure in the Finance Ministry, he was directly associated with as many as eight Union Budgets. Das is a postgraduate from St. Stephen’s College, Delhi University. He replaced Urjit Patel, who resigned abruptly in 2018 amid growing differences with the government over a range of subjects including the RBI’s autonomy.

The RBI kept the key benchmark rates unchanged for the eighth consecutive time in its October monetary policy review and promised to maintain the status-quo on rates “as long as necessary to revive growth.

“The repo rate, after being cut by 115 basis points (bps) in early 2020, has been held at a record low of 4 per cent since May 2020, while the reverse repo rate was reduced by 155 bps to 3.35 per cent.

Repo rate is the rate at which the RBI lends money to banks; while reverse repo rate is the rate at which the central bank borrows money from banks.