The Government of India on Monday appointed revenue secretary Sanjay Malhotra as the 26th Reserve Bank of India (RBI) governor succeeding Shaktikanta Das. The 56-year-old Indian Administrative Services (IAS) officer will be at the helm of RBI at a time when inflation is high, economic growth is slow and there is a call for the rate cut.
"The appointment committee of the cabinet has approved the appointment of Shri Sanjay Malhotra, IAS (1990), Secretary, Department of Revenue as Governor, Reserve Bank of India for a period of three years from 11.12.2024," the official government release stated.
Who Is the New RBI Governor?
The new RBI governor Sanjay Malhotra is a 1990 batch IAS Officer from the Rajasthan Cadre. His career spans over three decades in public policy and prior to his appointment, he was serving as revenue secretary in the ministry of finance.
Throughout his career of 33 years, Malhotra held a diverse portfolio including power, finance, taxation, information technology and mines.
He had also worked as the chairman and managing director of the state-run REC and served as a secretary in the Department of Financial Services in the Ministry of Finance.
Malhotra plays a key role in shaping tax policies for both direct and indirect taxes and reviews tax-related proposals for the Budget. He has been pivotal in driving the recent surge in tax collections and serves as the ex-officio secretary to the GST Council.
Sanjay Malhotra's Education
Malhotra holds an engineering degree in computer science from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur. He went to Princeton University in the United States to pursue a master's in public policy.
His appointment further reinforces the current government's increasing preference for former civil servants as chiefs of the central bank.
Malhotra's Policy Vision
Attending the 67th annual day of the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) earlier this month, the incoming governor told tax officials to prioritise the interests of the economy over collection efforts.
“If in the process of garnering some small revenue, we are hurting the whole industry and economy of the country…that is certainly not the intent,” ThePrint quoted Malhotra.
Malhotra pointed out during an interview with The Indian Express that tax certainty and stability are very important and keeping that in mind, expecting major changes in the budget on the taxation side is not correct.
Outgoing governor Shaktikanta Das' tenure will come to an end on December 10, 2024 after completing six years at the helm of RBI. Das in his last Monetary Policy Committee meeting kept the repo rate unchanged at 6.5 per cent for the 11th consecutive time with a 4:2 majority.
