Govt, RBI to decide on borrowing calendar for second half of FY18 today

The finance ministry and the RBI are scheduled to hold meeting on Thursday to decide about borrowing calender for the second half of the current fiscal, official sources said.

The meeting comes at a time when there are talks to relax fiscal deficit target with a view to perk up growth which has hit three-year low at 5.7 per cent in April-June.

Going by the Budget announcement, the meeting will decide calender for raising Rs 2.09 lakh crore during October-March period of 2017-18.

To finance the fiscal deficit of 3.2 per cent of GDP for 2017-18, the Budget had pegged gross borrowing at Rs 5.8 lakh crore and net borrowing at Rs 4.25 lakh crore.

Total redemptions of Rs 1.57 lakh crore are due next year of which 90 per cent will be redeemed in the first half.

During the first half ending September 30, the government decided to borrow about Rs 3.72 lakh crore from markets in the first half of next fiscal beginning April which is 64 per cent of the borrowing target for full financial year.