RBI Monetary Policy 2021: The Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) kept the repo rate unchanged at 4 per cent for the ninth consecutive time while maintaining an ‘accommodative stance’ as long as necessary, RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das announced on Wednesday.
The central bank governor said that the MPC had voted unanimously 5:1 to maintain the accommodative stance and added that the reverse repo rate too was kept unchanged at 3.35 per cent.
The RBI had last revised its policy repo rate or the short-term lending rate on May 22, 2020, in an off-policy cycle to perk up demand by cutting the interest rate to a historic low.
Speaking on the GDP, Das said that the projection for real GDP growth is maintained at 9.5 per cent. However, the RBI revised its Q3FY22 GDP growth to 6.6 per cent from 6.8 per cent earlier. Additionally, Q4FY22 GDP was cut to 6 per cent from 6.1 per cent earlier. The real GDP growth is projected at 17.2 per cent for Q1FY23 and at 7.8 per cent for Q2FY23.
Speaking about inflation, the RBI governor said that the FY22 CPI inflation target is maintained at 5.3 per cent. This consists of 5.1 per cent in Q3FY22, and 5.7 per cent in Q4FY22 with risks broadly balanced.
Das said the headline inflation would peak in the fourth quarter of the current fiscal.