RBI can sell USD 25 bn more to arrest rupee fall: SBI report
Mumbai, Sep 18 : The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) should intervene in both spot and forward markets to arrest Indian rupee's depreciation, suggested a State Bank of India (SBI) Ecowrap report on Tuesday.
As per the report, during the June 2008 to May 2009 period, when rupee depreciated by 13 per cent, the RBI sold dollars worth $43 billion, though the forex reserves at that time stood at $312 billion.
The report cited that even during 1990s, when the total forex reserve was less than $40 billion, the RBI had intervened in the market by selling 8-9 per cent of total reserve to rein in a fall in rupee.
"So, we believe in the present scenario, RBI could go up to its tolerance limit of 10 per cent (a crude proxy of the average ratio over all periods) by selling at least an additional $25 billion in the forex market," the report said.
The apex bank is known to enter the markets via intermediaries to either sell or buy US dollars to keep the rupee in a stable orbit.
In addition, the report said that oil companies may also be asked to purchase all their USD requirements directly from the RBI through a single bank, an arrangement that was used in 2013.
"Further, oil companies may also be asked to borrow USD for import payments directly from foreign branches of Indian Banks. These funds may be borrowed for longer term instead of the very short-term funds borrowed currently," the report said.
The report comes on a day when latest global trade protectionist measures, along with high crude oil prices, dragged the Indian rupee to a fresh low of 72.98 per US dollar.
At 5 p.m on Tuesday, the rupee closed at 72.98 per greenback from its previous close of 72.51 per dollar. It had opened at 72.60 per US dollar at the Inter-Bank Foreign Exchange Market and remained range bound.
However, the Indian currency's slide commenced from 4.45 p.m onwards as it touched 72.96 breaching its previous intra-day record low of 72.91 made on September 12.
According to analysts, concerns over a rise in inflation rate, growing protectionism in global trade and an outflow of foreign funds from the country's equity market have had an adverse impact on the Indian currency.
"After comments surfaced that Saudi Arabia is comfortable with higher crude oil prices, Brent prices jumped. At the same time, news came that China has warned of retaliation in trade," said Anindya Banerjee, Deputy Vice President for Currency and Interest Rates with Kotak Securities.
"Both these news, triggered a sharp decline in Chinese currency and rupee. Weak rupee caused a sell-off in Nifty."
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Gurugram Police arrest BJP Yuva Morcha member for spreading fake murder story on social media
New Delhi: Gurugram Police have arrested BJP Yuva Morcha member Hariom Mishra, for allegedly spreading a fabricated and communally sensitive story on social media about the murder of a college student in Gurugram.
Mishra who is also known as Shaurya Mishra had shared a collage of four photographs on his X handle earlier this month. He claimed that a 24-year-old college student, identified as Nikita Agarwal, had been murdered by her classmate Arif Khan in Gurugram. In the post, he alleged that the woman was blackmailed, forced into prostitution, gangraped, and eventually killed. He also claimed that Arif dumped her body in a forest. The claims were presented as being based on police sources.
The post went viral and garnering over 1.5 lakh views, and was amplified by several right-wing social media handles across X, Facebook and Instagram. A verification of the claims revealed that no such incident had taken place in Gurugram. A search of credible news reports showed no record of any such murder. The police said this news would have inevitably attracted media attention if it were true.
On December 11, Gurugram Police publicly refuted the claims through their official X handle. They stated that the information which was being circulated was completely false. The police warned that legal action would be taken against those spreading misinformation. Despite the warning, Mishra neither deleted the post nor issued any clarification.
Police in Gurugram confirmed Mishra's arrest on December 16. The police said a FIR was filed after he continued to spread false information about the alleged murder of a Hindu woman by Muslim man. Police said Mishra, a resident of Uttar Pradesh's Kaushambi district, is now being investigated.
Gurugram Police spokesperson Sandeep Singh told The Print that the accused had deliberately misrepresented facts and used objectionable content to spread hatred along religious lines. “Such posts can create serious disturbances in society, and the police take these matters very seriously,” he said.
A reverse image search conducted by fact-checkers at Alt News, revealed that the photographs used in the viral post were unrelated to the claims, while two of the images were traced to a Pinterest account belonging to influencer Maulik Chopra and another image was sourced from an Instagram post by influencer Shivam Thakur featuring a woman named Deepanshi Rawat. The fourth image was found on an unrelated Instagram page. The images depicted different individuals and had no connection to any crime.
Police said they are also investigating Mishra’s motive behind sharing the false and provocative content.
