With constant weakening of the rupee against the dollar, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Tuesday asserted the Indian currency has not collapsed and it is actually finding its natural course.
Making this point in the Rajya Sabha after some members expressed concern over the depreciation of the rupee and its collapse, she also said the Reserve Bank of India(RBI) is continuously monitoring the situation and intervening if there is volatility. Fielding questions of the rupee versus dollar value comparison during the Question Hour, which functioned smoothly for the first time since the monsoon session began on July 18, Sitharaman said in fact the performance of the local currency is much better. “It is comfortably placed,” she quipped.
"The RBI interventions are not so much to fix the value of the Indian Rupee because it is free to find its own course," the minister said adding interventions that are happening from the RBI side are more for containing volatility that is happening between the Indian rupee and the US dollar and so on. "Even the interventions being made by RBI are not so much to determine the value - increase or decrease, of the Indian rupee. It is not for that. It is more to avoid the volatility and allow it to find its course."India, like many other countries, is not pitching its currency at a level extraneously. So the ways and which we want to strengthen...The RBI and the Ministry are fairly engaged in it," she said.
On suggestion made by Vivek Tankha(Congress)to allow the Indian workers to remit dollars into the Indian banks in countries like the UAE to boost the reserve, she said it is not an assurance that the Ministry of Finance will give but she can only pass on the suggestion to the RBI.
Sitharaman said the rupee has seen more fluctuations against the US dollar but its performance is better than its peers. Actually, if you compare the Indian rupee versus other currencies, it is appreciating in its value, she said, urging the members to understand the context and speak about the Indian rupee.
On the foreign exchange reserves coming down, she said, "We are still somewhere in the range of (USD) 500 (billion). As of July 22, it was at USD 571.56 billion reserves, she said, adding that it was not a small amount and India is still comfortably placed.
Earlier, Luizinho Faleiro(TMC) claimed in the last six months, the rupee depreciated 28 times by 34 per cent and foreign reserves declined to USD 572 billion by mid-July.
During the UPA regime from 2004-2014, Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary said the value of the rupee in a year was down 10-12 per cent, whereas during the NDA government in the last eight years since 2014, the decline in the rupee is much less. He said that the US Dollar value has increased by 4.54 per cent.