Arun Jaitley says govt shares good relationship with RBI, pitches for merger or amalgamation of struggling banks

Reiterating that the Union government has a good functional relationship with the Reserve Bank of India, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, in an exclusive interview to _CNN-News1_8, said that the formation of the Monetary Policy Committee in 2016 led to a great co-ordination over the issue of inflation control. “We recognise the area which is governed by the RBI. Whatever we have to offer, we give it to them, and RBI takes its decision,” Jaitley said, adding, “We have clearly defined functions. RBI is doing its job. The monetary policy committee is also doing its job.” [caption id=“attachment_4334867” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File image of Finance Minister Arun Jaitley. PTI[/caption] Speaking to Rahul Joshi, Group Editor-in-Chief of Network18, on the Modi government’s plans to reform the banking sector, Jaitley said, “Earlier, banks were being looted. Today, we have given the creditor-lender relationship an IBC code and changed the whole game.” On the question of struggling banks, Jaitley favoured amalgamating or merging weaker banks with strong established banks, rather shutting them altogether. He also added that his priority is to strengthen the banking sector by recapitalising the banks. Watch the full interview with Jaitley at 10 pm on Monday.