Macro/Finance Group, NIPFP

Legislative strategy for setting up an independent debt management agency

Legislative strategy for setting up an independent debt management agency, Radhika Pandey and Ila Patnaik. NUJS Law Review, Volume 10 Issue 3 (2017).

The Public Debt Management Agency (PDMA) is a body that issues public debt with the objective of keeping long term costs of government borrowing low. In India, the existing legal framework obliges the government to give the task of managing its debt to the RBI. Pursuant to its role as debt manager, RBI set up market infrastructure such as an exchange and a depository. Carve-outs were made in the regulation of securities, to allow the RBI to regulate the bond market. Over the last 20 years, the proposal to establish an independent PDMA has been repeatedly put forward. In this paper, we work out the legal strategy to set up a PDMA. We show the transition path for the roll out and for the movement of the functions, accounts, records and systems to the new agency in a phased manner.

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