RBI Chief Urjit Patel Heckled By Congress Workers At Kolkata Airport

RBI Chief Urjit Patel Heckled By Congress Workers At Kolkata Airport Urjit Patel taken to safety by security personnel after he was heckled by Congress workers in Kolkata.

KOLKATA: On a day Bengal’s ruling Trinamool Congress declared that the Central government’s currency ban had resulted in nearly a hundred deaths, Urijit Patel, governor of the Reserve Bank of India or RBI, came within an inch of being manhandled at the Kolkata airport by angry Congress workers.

Mr Patel had just reached the airport around 6 pm to fly out of the city when he was met by angry Congress workers bearing black flags. As the mob threatened to swamp him, Mr Patel’s security staff just about managed to rush him into the airport with some difficulty.

Mr Patel had visited Kolkata for a board meeting at the RBI’s regional office this morning. He paid Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee a routine courtesy call in the afternoon. During the meeting at government secretariat Nabanna, Ms Banerjee, an angry critic of the currency ban, spoke her mind.

“He was silent most of the time ….but I got an opportunity to tell him what people are feeling,” she told the media after he left, adding, “The RBI is an autonomous body and should not be used for misused for politics.”

Ms Banerjee also said, “The double dhamaka of demonetisation has put GST in cold storage.”

She also gave Mr Patel and two page letter and a three-page memorandum in which she said the currency ban — meant to flush out black money and stop terror funding through counterfeiting — was a “cruel misadventure”.