India needs a global rupee – central bank governor

The globalization of the rupee is a key requirement for a fast-growing India, an economy hit hard by the oil and currency shocks from the Middle East conflict, its central bank governor has said.

New Delhi has repeatedly stressed the larger goal of internationalizing the rupee, prodding its agencies to build an enabling infrastructure for trading and settlement in currencies beyond the dollar-rupee pair.

“It is important as India is a growing economy, it is fast growing compared to other countries,” Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Sanjay Malhotra said at the Financial Congress of the Bank of Russia on Wednesday.

An increase in rupee-denominated transactions will help New Delhi become more insulated from currency shocks and widen its trade basket by facilitating trade with US-sanctioned countries.

New Delhi expects trade in rupees to become more common in the coming years as several countries, including some in Africa, have expressed an interest in establishing payment mechanisms using the Indian currency.

India and Russia have worked on alternative methods for carrying out transactions after the latter was removed from the SWIFT financial messaging system.

In September last year, Malhotra urged the Clearing Corporation of India to strengthen its offerings for retail investors in foreign exchange and government securities.

The central bank governor also said in a conversation with his Russian counterpart, Elvira Nabiullina, that the South Asian nation’s inflation-targeting framework has helped lower average inflation.

New Delhi is unlikely to raise its official inflation target, and there may be a case for lowering it over the long term, he said.

In a March review, the government retained its retail inflation target of 4%. India’s retail inflation stood at 3.93% in ⁠May, and the economy grew 7.8% year-on-year in the quarter ended March.