Yechury Says Govt Has Taken 99% of RBI Profits Since 2014 After Record Transfer

CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury attacked the Centre on Tuesday over the record transfer of funds from the Reserve Bank of India, claiming that 99 per cent of the central bank’s profits since 2014 had been “appropriated” by the government.

The RBI decision

His comments came a day after the RBI approved handing over a record Rs 1.76 lakh crore in dividend and surplus reserves to the government. The move was seen as improving the BJP-led government’s ability to boost the slowing economy without widening the fiscal deficit, and it set off a political row.

What Yechury said

In a tweet, the Left leader claimed that since 2014 the Modi government had taken 99 per cent of the RBI’s profits each year to pay for its publicity campaigns. He alleged that it had now taken Rs 1.76 lakh crore, ostensibly to recapitalise banks which, he claimed, had been looted by people close to the Prime Minister.

Yechury also said the health of leading public sector Navaratna companies had been badly hurt, both by falling demand and by the burden of large dividends taken by the government. Farmers, workers, small businesses, young people and women workers had all suffered, he said.

“The economy and people’s livelihoods have never been assaulted so mercilessly as under this government,” he said.

See also: Communist Party of India (Marxist) and our election news.

Originally published on 27 August 2019. Rewritten on 9 October 2026.

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