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Section: Daily Dispatches

India May Make Currency Fully Convertible
By Lifting Foreign Exchange Restrictions

By Ramola Talwar Badam
Associated Press
Sunday March 19, 2006

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/060319/india_free_currency.html?.v=3

BOMBAY, India -- India is looking into making its currency fully
convertible and lifting all restrictions on foreign exchange
transactions, a top government official said Sunday, a decade after
such plans were shelved following the East Asian economic crisis.

India's rupee currency is only partially convertible, meaning that
while the market takes care of most trade-related transactions,
investments flowing in and out of India -- also known as capital
account transactions -- are subject to restrictions and approval by
the central bank.

India will "set up a new mechanism" for making the rupee fully
convertible, said Montek Singh Ahluwalia, who heads the Planning
Commission, the country's top policy body.

Ahluwalia's comments at a weekend business conference in Bombay came
a day after Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said the country's
economic position had become "far more comfortable" about allowing
full freedom to convert rupee in foreign currencies to buy stocks,
properties and other capital assets.

Singh said such moves would also help India realize its aim to make
its business capital, Bombay, a financial hub in Asia.

Bankers welcomed the initiative.

"It's a good move and this is the right time to do it since the
external sector is quite strong now," said Sanjay Nayar, chief
executive at the Indian arm of Citigroup Inc.

India officially fixed the exchange rate until 1991, when it made
the first move to allow the market determine rupee's value in
relation to other currencies for select transactions.

Restrictions on most trade-related transactions and remittances were
lifted in the following years.

Transactions in some capital assets have also been freed from the
central bank's control, but a complete rupee free-float was delayed,
fearing the country could face a crisis like the East Asian currency
turmoil of 1997. That crisis devalued currencies of many countries,
wrecked growth and left thousands of people unemployed.

But India's rising foreign exchange reserves, which now total $US144
billion (E118 billion), and a strong rupee appear to have
contributed to the government's latest liberal stance.

Many institutional investors are transferring savings to India
because of higher interest rates and a booming stock market, and
rising exports have brought in more U.S. dollars and other foreign
currencies.

The Indian rupee has appreciated nearly one and half percent against
the U.S. dollar so far this year.

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