RBI Monetary Policy: No respite to home and auto loan borrowers; RBI keeps interest unchanged at 4%, maintains accommodative stance

New Delhi: The EMIs on home and auto loans are unlikely to come down in the near term as the Reserve Bank of India on Friday kept the key policy rates unchanged in its bi-monthly Monetary Policy review.

The central bank announcing the outcome of its bi-monthly Monetary Policy rates on February 5 said that it has decided to keep the repo rate unchanged at 4 percent and the reverse repo rate at 3.35 percent. The monetary policy committee also decided to continue with its accomodative stance. 

This is the first monetary policy announcement after the presentation of the Union Budget 2021-22. The Reserve Bank’s rate-setting Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) began its meeting on Wednesday. The six-member MPC headed by RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das has started its deliberations. After the three-day meeting, resolution of the MPC was announced today (February 5).

The MPC kept the key benchmark rate unchanged in its last three reviews. 

The RBI had last revised its policy rate on May 22, 2020, in an off-policy cycle to perk up demand by cutting interest rate to a historic low. The central bank has cut policy rates by 115 basis points since February last year.

India’s economy is likely to rebound with a 11 per cent growth in the next financial year as it makes a “V-shaped” recovery after witnessing a pandemic-led carnage, as per the Pre-Budget Economic Survey tabled in Parliament.

The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is projected to contract by a record 7.7 per cent in the current fiscal ending March 31, 2021.

CPI inflation eased sharply in December primarily on account of a substantial correction in food inflation — by 5 percentage points — to 3.9 per cent in December from 8.9 per cent in November.

Under the current dispensation, the RBI has been mandated by the government to maintain retail inflation at 4 per cent with a margin of 2 per cent on either side. The inflation target has to be reviewed by end-March 2021.