The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) announced on Thursday, October 27, 2022, that an off-cycle Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting will be held on November 3, 2022.
The meeting has been called after the RBI failed to keep the consumer price index (CPI) inflation target within the 2%-6% range for three consecutive quarters, or nine months — from January to September 2022.
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The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) announced the meeting under the provisions of Section 45ZN of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Act, 1934.
The RBI Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) Regulation 7 and the Monetary Policy Process Regulation, 2016 were also cited by the central bank.
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Since the RBI set up an inflation-targeting monetary policy framework in 2016, this is the first time an MPC meeting has been scheduled in accordance with Section 45ZN of the Act.
The RBI is required to submit a report to the government outlining the reasons for its failure to attain the inflation target, according to this section. The central bank must include in the report the corrective steps it intends to take, as well as an expected time frame for achieving the inflation target following the timely execution of the planned corrective actions.
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A separate meeting must be convened as part of the regular policy process to discuss and draft the report that will be forwarded to the government, according to Regulation 7 of the RBI MPC and Monetary Policy Process Regulations, 2016.
The report must be submitted to the government within one month from the date that the RBI failed to achieve the inflation target. The September CPI inflation statistics were announced on October 12 in this case. As a result, the RBI has till November 12 to submit the report to the government.
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The MPC has previously met in April, June, August, and September, according to this schedule. The MPC, on the other hand, convened an off-cycle meeting from May 2-4, 2022, during which it hiked the repo rate by 40 basis points (bps) for the first time in nearly four years.