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Reserve Bank of India

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Reserve Bank of India



 
 
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI, ) is the central bank
Central bank

A central bank, reserve bank, or monetary authority is the entity responsible for the monetary policy of a country or of a group of member states....
 of India
India

India, officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and outlying territories by total area country by geographical area, the List of countries by population country, and the most populous liberal democracy in the world....
, and was established on April 1, 1935 in accordance with the provisions of the Reserve Bank of India Act, 1934.






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Reserve Bank of India
Rbidelhi
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI, ) is the central bank
Central bank

A central bank, reserve bank, or monetary authority is the entity responsible for the monetary policy of a country or of a group of member states....
 of India
India

India, officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and outlying territories by total area country by geographical area, the List of countries by population country, and the most populous liberal democracy in the world....
, and was established on April 1, 1935 in accordance with the provisions of the Reserve Bank of India Act, 1934. The Central Office of the Reserve Bank was initially established in Calcutta but was permanently moved to Mumbai
Mumbai

Mumbai— formerly Bombay, is the capital of the Indian state of Maharashtra. The city proper has approximately 14 million people and, along with the neighbouring suburbs of Navi Mumbai and Thane, Mumbai forms the World's largest urban agglomerations according to the United Nations World Urbanization Prospects report with around 19...
 in 1937. Though originally privately owned, RBI has been fully owned by the Government of India
Government of India

The Government of India , officially referred to as the Union Government, and also as Central Government, was established by the Constitution of India, and is the governing authority of a federal union of States and territories of India, collectively called the Republic of India....
 since nationalization in 1949.

Duvvuri Subbarao
Duvvuri Subbarao

Duvvuri Subbarao is the twenty-second Governor of Reserve Bank of India . Subbarao took over from Y. Venugopal Reddy, the previous governor on 5 September 2008....
 who succeeded Yaga Venugopal Reddy on September 2, 2008 is the current Governor
Governor

A governor is a governing official, usually the Executive of a non-sovereign level of government, ranking under the head of state. In federations, a governor may be the title of each appointed or elected politician who governs a constitutive state....
 of RBI.

The Reserve Bank of India was set up on the recommendations of the Hilton Young Commission. The commission submitted its report in the year 1926, though the bank was not set up for nine years.

The Preamble of the Reserve Bank of India describes the basic functions of the Reserve Bank as to regulate the issue of Bank Notes and keeping of reserves with a view to securing monetary stability in India and generally to operate the currency and credit system of the country to its advantage.

It has 22 regional offices, most of them in state capitals.

Board of directors

The Reserve Bank's affairs are governed by a central board of directors. The board is appointed by the Government of India in keeping with the Reserve Bank of India Act.

On June 27, 2006, the Union Government of India reconstituted the Central Board of Directors of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) with 13 members, including Azim Premji
Azim Premji

Azim Premji , , is an Indian businessman. He is the Chairman of Wipro, one of the largest software companies in India. Its headquarters are in Bengaluru, "the Indian Silicon City"....
 and Kumar Mangalam Birla
Kumar Mangalam Birla

Kumar Mangalam Birla June 14, 1967), is Chairman of the Aditya Birla Group, which is among India's largest business houses. Among its major companies in India are Grasim, Hindalco, UltraTech Cement, Aditya Birla Nuvo and Idea Cellular....
.

Those renominated to the board

  • Y. H. Malegam, Chartered Accountant, (to represent Western Area Local Board)
  • H. P. Ranina, Supreme Court Advocate
  • Ashok S. Ganguly, Member, Investment Commission and Chairman, ICICI OneSource


Retiring directors

  • N. R. Narayana Murthy
    N. R. Narayana Murthy

    Nagavara Ramarao Narayana Murthy better known as N. R. Narayana Murthy, is an Indian industrialist, software engineer and one of the seven founders of Infosys Technologies, a global consulting and IT services company based in India....
  • Mihir Rakshit
    Mihir Rakshit

    Mihir Kanti Rakshit , is one of India's foremost economists. He is the Director of Monetary Research Project at , Calcutta. He has been elected the President of to be held in January 2009....
  • K. Madhava Rao
  • V. S. Vyas
  • K. P. Singh
    K. P. Singh

    Kushal Pal Singh or K.P. Singh was born on August 15, 1931, at Bulandshahar in Uttar Pradesh. Today he presides over DLF Universal Limited, India?s largest real estate developer....
  • Amrita Patel
  • k.p.priya


On 1 July 2006, in an attempt to enhance the quality of customer service and strengthen the grievance redressal mechanism, the Reserve Bank of India constituted a new department — Customer Service Department (CSD).

Main objectives


Regulator and supervisor of the financial system

  • Prescribes broad parameters of banking operations within which the country's banking and financial system functions.
  • Objective: maintain public confidence in the system, protect depositors' interest and provide cost-effective banking services to the public. The Banking Ombudsman Scheme has been formulated by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) for effective redressal of complaints by bank customers.


Manager of exchange control

  • Manages the Foreign Exchange Management Act, 1999.
  • Objective: to facilitate external trade and payment and promote orderly development and maintenance of foreign exchange market in India.


Issuer of currency

  • Issues and exchanges or destroys currency and coins not fit for circulation.
  • Objective: the main objective is to give the public adequate supply of currency of good quality and to provide loans to commercial bank
    Commercial bank

    A commercial bank is a type of financial intermediary and a type of bank. Commercial banking is also known as business banking. It is a bank that provides checking accounts, savings accounts, and money market accounts and that accepts time deposits....
    s to maintain or improve the GDP.
The basic objectives of RBI are to issue bank notes, to maintain the currency and credit system of the country to utilize it in its best advantage, and to maintain the reserves. RBI maintains the economic structure of the country so that it can achieve the objective of price stability as well as economic development, because both objectives are diverse in themselves.

Developmental role

  • Performs a wide range of promotional functions to support national objectives.
  • To incubate or establish financial institutions of national importance, for e.g: NABARD, IDBI,


Related functions

  • Banker to the Government: performs merchant banking function for the central and the state governments; also acts as their banker.
  • Bank to banks: maintains banking accounts of all scheduled banks


There is now an international consensus about the need to focus the tasks of a central bank upon central banking. RBI is far out of touch with such a principle, owing to the sprawling mandate described above. hhtayssas

Major liabilities of commercial banks

Figures below are in millions of Indian Rupees. See and
Year Deposits and other Accounts Bills Payable
1950 19,983 173
1955 11,592 262
1960 20,218 317
1965 32,897 446
1970 64,793 923
1975 156,665 2,254
1980 439,869 10,995
1985 1,032,134 24,556
1990 1,820,468 38,656
1995 3,984,352 116,622


Major assets of commercial banks

Figures below are in millions of Indian Rupees. See and
Year Investments Advances
1950 4,330 5,353
1955 4,600 7,037
1960 7,241 12,458
1965 9,884 21,954
1970 18,148 46,850
1975 45,999 106,167
1980 126,642 272,000
1985 303,378 623,553
1990 687,151 1,095,412
1995 1,750,206 2,243,308


Tarapore committee


The Tarapore committee is a committee setup by the Reserve Bank of India under the chairmanship of former RBI deputy governor S S Tarapore to "lay the road map" to capital account convertibility
Capital Account Convertibility

Capital Account Convertibility or CAC is a monetary policy that centers around the ability to conduct transactions of local financial assets into foreign financial assets freely and at market determined exchange rates....
.

The five-member committee recommended a three-year timeframe for complete convertibility by 1999-2000.

In March 2006, the then Finance Minister of India
Finance Minister of India

The Finance Minister of India is a Cabinet position in the Government of India. He drafts the union budget of India of the country, and is in charge of the national economy....
, P Chidambaram said that the Central government was "within striking distance" of implementing the committee's report.

  • During partition, the federal reserve was split by the British Raj to aid India and Pakistan separately. Some claim that Pakistan has never gotten its share to date, which is incorrect. On January 19, 1948, Pakistan received its share of 56 Crores Rupees bullion. Apart from that, Nizam of Hyderabad illegally transferred the funds for the state of Hyderabad to Pakistan, and Pakistan has not yet repaid these funds. Nawab of Junagarh fled with 3 Crore cash, which was government property. When it looked like the British would help India get that money back, the Pakistani government helped Nawab flee to Europe with the money using Pakistani government planes. One of the planes refuelling at Beirut crashed in the Aegean Sea and money was declared lost. This story has led to several modern treasure hunts in that area.


See also

  • Governors of the Reserve Bank of India
  • Indian Rupee
    Indian rupee

    The rupee is the currency of India. The issuance of the currency is controlled by the Reserve Bank of India. The most commonly used symbols for the rupee are Rs, ? and ??....
  • Central Bank
    Central bank

    A central bank, reserve bank, or monetary authority is the entity responsible for the monetary policy of a country or of a group of member states....
  • Zonal Training Centre
    Zonal Training Centre

    Zonal Training Centre, or ZTC as it is commonly known, is the training centre of Reserve Bank of India for its officers and staff. RBI has four such training centres, the biggest and most prominent of them being at CBD Belapur....


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