RBI chief Urjit Patel to appear before parliamentary panel again

The Reserve Bank of India Governor Urjit Patel will again appear before the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance, as many MPs said they were not satisfied with his responses on demonetization at the previous meeting in January. The BJP members in the panel including Nishikant Dubey were not in favour of calling Patel, but were persuaded by former prime minister Manmohan Singh, who is also a member of the committee headed by Congress MP Veerapa Moily.

Top sources and members of the committee said that Patel has been asked to appear again before it to brief the members about demonetization as the discussion on it is yet to be concluded. The committee had earlier decided to call RBI Governor and ministry officials again as the members could not complete their questions.

Sources privy to development said the members in the panel are likely to ask Patel about how much money has returned to the system. The members will also inquire as to when bank operations will be normal.

The MPs said the RBI Governor at the last meeting could not give figures of how much money returned to banks. The only new piece of information Patel provided is that Rs 9.2 trillion worth of currency was injected into the economy after the November 8 ban on high-value currency notes.