Amid uncertainties over Britain's exit from the European Union (EU) block, Raghuram Rajan, the former Governor of the Reserve Bank of India, has become the top contender for the post of the Bank of England Governor. Mark Joseph Carney is the incumbent Governor of the Bank of England. The deadline for applying for the Bank of England's chief got over last week.
Carney's term at the helm of the Bank of England has been overshadowed by the country's decision to pull out of the EU. During his tenure, Carney has warned multiple times that 'Brexit' is expected to negatively influence the UK economy. However, the hardliners have accused him of inflating the ill consequences and dismissing the benefits of leaving the EU. Now, as the latest deadline of October 31 to bow out of the trade block looms closer, bookmakers and economists are betting on Raghuram Rajan.
Rajan has an impeccable record while serving at multiple economic institutions during his career as an economist. He served as the chief economist of the IMF from 2003 to 2006 and was one of the selected economists who predicted the financial crisis of 2008. He was the former Governor of RBI and played a major role in inflation targeting and led an effort to clean up bad debts in the country's banking industry.
Rajan has been sympathetic with UK's confusion over Brexit and has said that the success of the decision depends on how the UK initiates economic re-engagement with the world. Apart from Rajan, David Blanchflower, an economics professor at Dartmouth College and a former Bank of England policy maker, and Andrew Bailey, who was Deputy Governor of the Bank of England from 2013 to 2016, are also in the race.
Anne Krueger, a former IMF first deputy managing director, said, "He handled some very treacherous shoals very well. He did not cave under political pressure and on the other hand, he did the best he could to advance what he thought was right."
However, with all the speculations making rounds, Rajan has maintained a tight lip. In an interview published in Forbes last week, he had said that central banking jobs are "very polluted". He further added, "You have to have a very good sense of where the political terrain lies and how far you can go without upsetting the balance."
