The Tirupur Exporters Association (TEA) today welcomed RBI’s full preparedness to meet out the eventualities caused in the Foreign Currency market after the redemption of Foreign Currency Non Resident (FCNR) (Bank) of about USD 26 billion in September 2016.

Reacting to the third Bi-monthly Monetary Policy State for the Year 2016-17, TEA president, A. Shaktivel appreciated the maintaining of the Foreign Exchange resource at USD 365.7 billion from July 5 last.

Quoting the RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan’s statement that, despite easy liquidity, banks have passed past rate cuts into lending rate only modestly, Shaktivel appealed to the banks to reduce lending rates and help the SME exporting units to stay competitive, and also attract them to make investments in the new projects.

This would also help them enjoy the 25 per cent capital subsidy benefit given under the Amended Technology Upgradation Fund Scheme, announced recently in Special Package for garment sector, he said.

Repo Rate remained unchanged and kept at 6.5 per cent, Shaktivel said, adding that the policy stance and rationale behind this is the projected trajectory of inflation over the rest of the year due to increase in food prices, pulses and cereals.