Ex-RBI chief reveals frosty ties with Chidambaram
RBI governors share bitter-sweet relationship with the government but rarely has any central banker contemplated leaving his job twice, as did Y Venugopal Reddy, who wanted to quit soon after P Chidambaram became finance minister in 2004 and then before his tenure ended.
By : migrator
Update: 2017-06-25 16:21 GMT
New Delhi
Reddy, who was Reserve Bank Governor from September 2003 to September 2008, shared an uncomfortable relationship with Chidambaram and had to even offer an “unconditional apology” to the minister after the then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh tried to sort things out between them.
In his autobiography Advice and Dissent: My Life in Public Service, Reddy said the two started off on a disagreement over opening of banking system to foreign ownership and by 2008 “there was a growing distance betweenus.”
“His (Chidambaram’s) image as a reformer pushing for double-digit growth was, in his view, being dented by my caution to the extent of resisting implementation of some of his policies,” Reddy wrote.
The minister even cancelled a foreign tour because he could not face investors with nothing to report on reform. The former bureaucrat went on to write that in early 2008 he got a call from the Prime Minister’s Office, requiring him to urgently travel to Delhi to meet Manmohan Singh on a Sunday.
At prime minister’s residence, Singh told the governor: “Venu, the finance minister is very upset with you. I do not know what to do. I cannot be taking sides between Chidambaram and you. I am very worried about this.”
Reddy says, he told Singh that he need not bother about this problem and that he will take care of his relation with the minister.
Reddy writes that he drove to Chidambaram’s residence and “expressed my unconditional apology to him and conveyed that I would keep in mind the issue of being supportive” to government policies.
In 2007 Reddy offered his candidature for the position of chairman, 13th Finance Commission, but the minister would not release him.
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