On Saturday, barely hours after Raghuram Rajan made it known that he would not seek a second term as RBI Governor, BJP MP Subramanian Swamy, who has been carrying on a campaign against him, tweeted: “R3 has said he will go back to US. Whatever figleaf he wants for hiding the reality we should not grudge it. Say good bye!”
The uncertainty about a second term for Rajan began after Swamy launched a series of personal attacks on him.
So vicious was Swamy’s campaign that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had to step in to underline that no decision had been taken on the issue of renominating Rajan.
However, Rajan ended all speculation by withdrawing.
Swamy, who is perceived by many as a contender for the top job at RBI, started his public spat with Rajan last month, even writing to Modi seeking Rajan’s removal. Swamy alleged that Rajan was not “mentally fully Indian” and had kept interest rates too high for too long, hurting industry.
In his most recent attack, Swamy had tweeted on June 16, “R3 wants to decrease the value of Indian investment to 3 per cent so foreigners can buy everything in distress sale… R3’s policies are creating coterie of foreign bankers and fraud Indian industrialists who are parking debt with ARC after defaulting.”
He had also written a second letter to the Prime Minister accusing Rajan and RBI officials providing licences to small financial banks for illegal dealings. He had suggested a probe by a Special Investigation Team.
In other tweets directed at the RBI Governor, he had accused him of allowing Sharia-compliant financial institutions to be set up in the country and had also questioned how and when Rajan managed to predict the global financial crisis of 2008.