"When I took over on August 1 (2012), I knew that I was returning to a very difficult pitch," Finance Minister P Chidambaram today said braving the opposition attack over the bad state of economy reflected by declining value of rupee and rising food prices.
During a debate on the economic situation in the Lok Sabha, he attributed much of the current economic woes to the stimulus provided to help the industry to tide over the problems emanating from the global financial meltdown of 2008.
President Pranab Mukherjee was the Finance Minister when the stimulus was provided to the industry. Chidambaram succeeded him as Finance Minister in August 2012.
Recalling his return, Chidambaram said, "Fiscal deficit limits had been breached. The CAD had swelled. These were the two main challenges, apart from the number of other challenges that we had to face."
After that he claimed that situation had improved till the unexpected development on May 22, 2013, when the US Federal Reserve announced tapering of bond purchases which sent the emerging markets in a tizzy.
"In the last 12 months there have been days when I have been more upbeat; days when I been more downcast. But the fact is some stability did return to the economy until a completely unexpectedly unexpected event took place on May 22, 2013", he said.
He attributed tumbling of rupee to that announcement of Federal Reserve.
The rupee today breached the 66 to a dollar level in the intra-day trade, while the BSE Sensex nosedived by 590 points to settle below 18,000 mark.
