Neither doctor nor patient

Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Deputy Governor K C Chakrabarty, once the most loquacious of central bank officials, has turned ultra-discreet after his 2010 criticism of RBI’s handling of monetary policy cost him key portfolios. So, reporters in Hyderabad were hard-pressed to get a comment out of him on Standard & Poor’s (S&P) downgrade of its outlook on India last week. After a volley of pointed questions, someone eventually asked how S&P and Moody’s could have two different views on India. His response was that if someone visits 10 doctors he is likely to get 10 opinions. Asked if he agreed with either agency, Chakrabarty said he was not a doctor (that is, a rating agency). And on whether RBI would be impacted by S&P’s outlook, he added laconically, “Nor am I a patient because we have never gone for sovereign borrowings.”