Last Updated: 23 December 2023
Before we get into the list of RBI Governors of India, let’s have a quick intro to the Governors of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).
The Reserve Bank of India is India’s central bank and regulatory body responsible for the regulation of the Indian banking system. It is under the ownership of the Ministry of Finance, Government of India.
It is responsible for the issue and supply of the Indian Rupee (₹) and manages the country’s main payment systems and works to promote its economic development. RBI was established on 1st April 1935 in Kolkata under the RBI Act, 1934, and was formed with the recommendation of the “Hilton Young Commission”.
RBI consists of the following:
- Governor: 1
- Deputy Governor: 4
- Executive Directors: 15
The Governor of the Reserve Bank of India is the Chief Executive Officer of India’s Central Bank and the Ex-Officio Chair of its Central Board of Directors.
Indian Rupee (₹) currency notes, issued by the Reserve Bank of India, bear the Governor’s signature. Since its establishment in 1935 by the Government of India, the RBI has been headed by twenty-five (25) Governors.
The Governor of the Reserve Bank of India is a member of the Strategic Policy Group headed by National Security Advisor Ajit Doval. It is a crucial wing of the National Security Council.
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Fascinating Facts
- The inaugural officeholder was a British Banker, Sir Osborne Smith, while Sir C. D. Deshmukh was the first native Indian Governor.
- Sir C. D. Deshmukh is the first Indian RBI Governor and the first Governor after India’s Independence.
- Sir Benegal Rama Rau is the longest-serving governor, holding the office for 7 Years 197 Days, while Amitav Ghosh’s 20 Days term is the shortest.
- The term of office typically runs for three years and can, in some cases, be extended for another two years.
- The Reserve Bank of India’s fifteenth governor, Dr. Manmohan Singh, later became India’s thirteenth Prime Minister.
- Raghuram Rajan held the post of Governor of RBI for exactly 3 Years and 0 Days.
- ₹ 2,50,000 is the official salary of the Governor of RBI.
- Shaktikanta Das is the twenty-fifth Governor of the Reserve Bank of India since 12 December 2018.
List Of RBI Governors
No. | Governor | Term In | Term Out | Tenure | Background |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Osborne Smith | 01 Apr 1935 | 30 Jun 1937 | 2 Y 90 D | Banker |
2 | James Braid Taylor | 01 Jul 1937 | 17 Feb 1943 | 5 Y 231 D | ICS Officer |
3 | C. D. Deshmukh | 11 Aug 1943 | 30 Jun 1949 | 5 Y 323 D | ICS Officer |
4 | Benegal Rama Rau | 01 Jul 1949 | 14 Jan 1957 | 7 Y 197 D | ICS Officer |
5 | K. G. Ambegaonkar | 14 Jan 1957 | 28 Feb 1957 | 45 D | ICS Officer |
6 | H. V. R. Iyengar | 01 Mar 1957 | 28 Feb 1962 | 4 Y 364 D | ICS Officer |
7 | P. C. Bhattacharya | 01 Mar 1962 | 30 Jun 1967 | 5 Y 121 D | IAAS Officer |
8 | Lakshmi Kant Jha | 01 Jul 1967 | 03 May 1970 | 2 Y 306 D | ICS Officer |
9 | B. N. Adarkar | 04 May 1970 | 15 Jun 1970 | 42 D | Economist |
10 | Sarukkai Jagannathan | 16 Jun 1970 | 19 May 1975 | 4 Y 337 D | ICS Officer |
11 | N. C. Sen Gupta | 19 May 1975 | 19 Aug 1975 | 92 D | ICS Officer |
12 | K. R. Puri | 20 Aug 1975 | 02 May 1977 | 1 Y 255 D | LIC Director |
13 | M. Narasimham | 03 May 1977 | 30 Nov 1977 | 211 days | RBI Officer |
14 | I. G. Patel | 01 Dec 1977 | 15 Sep 1982 | 4 Y 288 D | Economist |
15 | Manmohan Singh | 16 Sep 1982 | 14 Jan 1985 | 2 Y 120 D | Economist |
16 | Amitav Ghosh | 15 Jan 1985 | 04 Feb 1985 | 20 D | Banker |
17 | R. N. Malhotra | 04 Feb 1985 | 22 Dec 1990 | 5 Y 321 D | IAS Officer |
18 | S. Venkitaramanan | 22 Dec 1990 | 21 Dec 1992 | 1 Y 365 D | IAS Officer |
19 | C. Rangarajan | 22 Dec 1992 | 21 Nov 1997 | 4 Y 334 D | Economist |
20 | Bimal Jalan | 22 Nov 1997 | 06 Sep 2003 | 5 Y 288 D | Economist |
21 | Y. Venugopal Reddy | 06 Sep 2003 | 05 Sep 2008 | 4 Y 365 D | IAS Officer |
22 | D. Subbarao | 05 Sep 2008 | 04 Sep 2013 | 4 Y 364 D | IAS Officer |
23 | Raghuram Rajan | 04 Sep 2013 | 04 Sep 2016 | 3 Y 0 D | Economist |
24 | Urjit Patel | 04 Sep 2016 | 10 Dec 2018 | 2 Y 98 D | Economist |
25 | Shaktikanta Das | 12 Dec 2018 | Incumbent | ~ | IAS Officer |
List of Current Central Board of Directors of RBI
Facts About RBI Governors
1Osborne Smith (1 Apr 1935 – 30 Jun 1937)
- He served for over 20 years with the Bank of New South Wales and 10 years with the Commonwealth Bank of Australia.
- Sir Osborne was the Managing Governor of the Imperial Bank of India before becoming the first RBI Governor.
- His stewardship of the Imperial Bank won him recognition in banking circles in India.
- He resigned prior to the completion of his term of office of three and a half years.
- Sir Osborne did not sign any banknotes during his tenure.
2James Braid Taylor (1 Jul 1937- 17 Feb 1943)
- Sir James Braid Taylor was a member of the Indian Civil Service.
- He served as a Deputy Governor of the RBI prior to his appointment as the Governor.
- His stewardship saw the Bank through the war years and the financial experiments it engendered and catalyzed.
- He governed the bank during the war years and was involved in the decision to move from a silver currency to fiat money.
- He was closely associated with the preparation and piloting of the Reserve Bank of India Bill.
- Even though he was the second Governor, his signature was the first to appear on the currency notes of the Indian Rupee.
- His second term came to an end with his sudden demise.
3C. D. Deshmukh (11 Aug 1943 – 30 Jun 1949)
- Chintaman Dwarkanath Deshmukh was the first Indian to be appointed as the Governor of the Reserve Bank of India.
- He served as the Finance Minister in the Union Cabinet from 1950 to 1956, the Chairman of UGC from 1956 to 1961, and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Delhi from 1962 to 1967.
- During his tenure as Governor, he represented India at the Bretton Woods negotiations in 1944, saw the transition to Independence and the partition of the country, and the division of the assets and liabilities of the Reserve Bank between India and Pakistan.
- He helped the smooth transition of the Bank from a shareholder’s institution to a State-owned organization, when the Reserve Bank of India was nationalized on 1st January 1949.
4Benegal Rama Rau (1 Jul 1949 – 14 Jan 1957)
- He was the longest-serving Governor of the Reserve Bank of India.
- His tenure witnessed the commencement of the Planning Era as well as innovative initiatives in the spheres of cooperative credit and industrial finance.
- The recommendations of the All India Rural Credit Survey Committee appointed during his tenure led to the transformation of the Imperial Bank of India to the State Bank of India (SBI: 1 July 1955).
- Benegal Rau was appointed Chairman of the Bombay Port Trust (1941–1946).
- He served as the ambassador of India to Japan (1947–1948) and Ambassador of India to the United States (1948–1949).
5K. G. Ambegaonkar (14 Jan 1957 – 28 Feb 1957)
- K. G. Ambegaokar was the fifth Governor of the Reserve Bank of India from 14 January 1957 to 28 February 1957.
- He was a member of the Indian Civil Service and served as Finance Secretary before his appointment as Deputy Governor of the RBI.
- His tenure was the third-shortest (45 days) after B. N. Adarkar (42 Days) and Amitav Ghosh (20 Days).
- Compared to the latter two Governors Ambegaonkar’s signature as RBI Governor does not appear on any Indian Rupee note.
- His signature as Finance Secretary appeared on the second, third, and fourth Rupee one notes issued after independence.
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6H. V. R. Iyengar (1 Mar 1957 – 28 Febr 1962)
- He served as the Chairman of the State Bank of India before being appointed as the Governor of the Reserve Bank.
- His tenure witnessed India’s shift to a decimal coinage system from the earlier system of pies, paise, and anna systems.
- H. V. R. Iyengar was invested as a Companion of the Order of the Indian Empire (CIE) in the 1941 New Year Honours.
- During his tenure, variable cash reserve ratio and selective credit control were introduced for the first time in India.
- He received the Padma Vibhushan, India`s second-highest civilian honor from the Government of India in 1962.
7P. C. Bhattacharya (1 Mar 1962 – 30 Jun 1967)
- He was a member of the Indian Audits and Accounts Service (IA&AS).
- Bhattacharya was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 1946 New Year Honours.
- He served as Secretary of the Finance Ministry and later as Chairman of the State Bank of India before his appointment as the Governor.
- As an RBI Governor, he strongly opposed the nationalizing of private banks in India, by writing a letter to the then Deputy Prime Minister Morarji Desai warning about the costs of nationalizing the banks saying it was not desirable.
- During his tenure, the size of the currency notes of denominations 5, 10, and 100 was reduced in size to cut the cost of production, which makes these notes relatively rare in the collectors market.
- Bhattacharya’s tenure saw the establishment of the Industrial Development Bank of India in 1964, the Agricultural Refinance Corporation in 1963, and the Unit Trust of India in 1964.
- The banknotes signed by P C Bhattacharya have very high resale value in the grey market because of their rarity.
8Lakshmi Kant Jha (1 Jul 1967 – 3 May 1970)
- During his tenure the Indian Rupee notes of denominations of the Indian Rupee symbol ₹ 2, 5, 10, and 100, commemorating the birth centenary of Mahatma Gandhi were released on 2nd October 1969, these notes bear his signature, both in English and Hindi.
- The signature in Hindi, the official language of the Government of India, appeared on the currency notes for the first time during his stewardship of the RBI.
- His tenure saw the nationalization of 14 major commercial banks, the introduction of social controls over commercial banks, the establishment of the National Credit Council, and the introduction of the Lead Bank Scheme to facilitate credit delivery.
- He served as India’s ambassador to the United States during the crucial period 1970 – 1973 when India fought a war with Pakistan and liberated Bangladesh.
- Lakshmi Kant was the governor of Jammu and Kashmir state from 3 July 1973 to 22 February 1981.
9B. N. Adarkar (4 May 1970 – 15 Jun 1970)
- His term was the second-shortest (42 Days) after Amitav Ghosh who had served for only 20 Days.
- His term was short since he was filling in as interim before S. Jaganathan took over.
- Adarkar was an economist and had served in the office of the Economic Adviser of the Government of India.
- In March 1947 before Indian independence, he was appointed by the Government of India to create a health insurance scheme for industrial workers.
- A year later the report he submitted became the basis for the Employment State Insurance (ESI) Act of 1948.
10Sarukkai Jagannathan (16 Jun 1970 – 19 May 1975)
- Prior to becoming the Governor of the RBI, he was India’s Executive Director at the World Bank.
- The oil shock of the 1970s was re-elected by a very active monetary policy during his tenure.
- The Credit Guarantee Corporation of India and State Level Bankers’ Committees were established during his tenure.
- Indian Rupee notes of ₹20 and ₹50 denominations were introduced, and these had his signature.
- He relinquished office to take up the post of India’s Executive Director at the International Monetary Fund.
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11N. C. Sen Gupta (19 May 1975 – 19 Aug 1975)
- Nirmal Chandra Sen Gupta was the eleventh Governor of the Reserve Bank of India from 19 May 1975 to 19 August 1975.
- Before being appointed as the Governor of RBI, he was the secretary to the Department of Banking of the Ministry of Finance.
- Even though his tenure was short (92 Days), his signature appears on the Indian rupee note of 1,000 denomination.
- ₹1,000 was the only note that bears his signature.
12K. R. Puri (20 Aug 1975 – 2 May 1977)
- He was the Chairman and Managing Director of the Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) prior to his appointment as Governor of the RBI.
- His signature appears on one of the last Indian rupee notes of the ₹1,000 denomination.
- These notes were demonetized in 1978 and were re-introduced after a period of 22 years in 2000.
- During his tenure, the Regional Rural Banks were set up.
- The twenty-point economic program was announced and operationalized and a new money supply series was introduced during his tenure.
13M. Narasimham (3 May 1977 – 30 Nov 1977)
- He is often referred to as the father of banking reforms in India for his contributions to the banking and financial sector in India.
- Some of the reforms attributed to his recommendations include changes to banking structures, the introduction of private sector banks, the creation of asset recovery funds, rural banking, changes to capital adequacy and provisioning standards, technology up-gradation, and modernization of public sector banks, and capital market-linked banking reforms.
- Narasimham also served as India’s executive director at the World Bank and later at the International Monetary Fund and the Asian Development Bank.
- He served as the secretary of the Ministry of Finance, and as the additional secretary of the Department of Economic Affairs.
- He was awarded India’s second-highest civilian honor Padma Vibhushan in 2000.
14I. G. Patel (1 Dec 1977 – 15 Sep 1982)
- Indraprasad Gordhanbhai Patel was an Indian economist and civil servant.
- He served as the Director of the London School of Economics, making him the first person of Indian origin to head a higher education institute in the United Kingdom.
- He also served as Chairperson of the Board of Governors from 1996 to 2001 at the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad.
- I. G. Patel is well known for his formidable intellectual powers in the select company of central bankers and economic statesmen such as the “Committee of the Thirty” set up by the former German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt.
- Mr. Patel served as the Deputy Administrator at United Nations Development Programme headquarters in New York.
15Manmohan Singh (16 Sep 1982 – 14 Jan 1985)
- Manmohan Singh is an Indian economist, academic, and politician who was the 13th Prime Minister of India from 2004 to 2014.
- He is the longest-serving Prime Minister of India after Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi and the first Sikh Prime Minister of India.
- Singh was the Chief Economic Advisor (1972–1976) and Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission (1985–1987).
- He was the secretary-general of the South Commission, an independent economic policy think tank headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland from 1987 to November 1990.
- He also served as the Finance Minister of India from 21 June 1991 to 15 May 1996.
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16Amitav Ghosh (15 Jan 1985 – 4 Feb 1985)
- Amitav Ghosh is the shortest-serving Governor of RBI for 20 Days from 15th January to 4th February 1985.
- Before being appointed as the Governor of RBI, Ghosh was the chairman of Allahabad Bank, Director of the IDBI Bank, and the governing body of the National Institute of Bank Management.
- Amitav Ghosh had been appointed as the RBI Deputy Governor before being appointed as the Governor.
- He died at the age of 90.
17R. N. Malhotra (4 Feb 1985 – 22 Dec 1990)
- Malhotra was a member of the Indian Administrative Service.
- He had served as the Secretary of Finance and as India’s Executive Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) before his appointment as Governor of the RBI.
- The Discount and Finance House of India, and the National Housing Bank were set up, and the Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research was inaugurated during his tenure.
- In the field of rural finance, the Service Area Approach was adopted as an approach to catalyze the flow of credit through commercial banks.
- During his tenure, the 500-rupee note was introduced, He signed the 8hq A 50 rupees note in 1986.
- In 1990 he was the recipient of the Padma Bhushan Award.
- His wife Anna Rajam Malhotra was the first woman member of the Indian Administrative Service.
18S. Venkitaramanan (22 Dec 1990 – 21 Dec 1992)
- He served as the Finance Secretary in the Ministry of Finance from 1985 to 1989.
- Venkitaramanan is seen by many as a brilliant crisis manager of the balance of payments crisis in India in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
- His timely and decisive action laid the groundwork for India to salvage the crisis, at a time when India’s foreign-exchange reserves had almost depleted.
- His term saw India adopt the IMF’s stabilization program where the Rupee underwent a devaluation and the launch of the program of economic reforms.
- During his tenure as RBI Governor, the infamous Harshad Mehta scam was exposed by Sucheta Dalal.
19C. Rangarajan (22 Dec 1992 – 21 Nov 1997)
- He is the former Chairman of the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council.
- In the field of monetary policy, his tenure saw the historic memorandum signed between the Bank and the Government whereby a cap was put on the automatic finance by the Bank to the Government in the form of ad hoc treasury bills.
- Rangarajan is the Chairman of the Madras School of Economics, former President of the Indian Statistical Institute, and the Founding Chairman of the CR Rao Advanced Institute of Mathematics, Statistics, and Computer Science.
- He served as the Chancellor of the University of Hyderabad and a professor at Ahmedabad University.
- Chakravarthi Rangarajan received his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Pennsylvania in 1964. His thesis was titled “Variability of Demand Deposits”.
- He served as a Deputy Governor of the Reserve Bank of India from 1982 to 1991, after which he served as the Governor of the Reserve Bank of India between 22 December 1992 and 21 December 1997.
20Bimal Jalan (22 Nov 1997 – 6 Sep 2003)
- Dr. Bimal Jalan served as Chief Economic Advisor to the Government of India, Banking Secretary, Finance Secretary, Member Secretary of the Planning Commission, and Chairman of the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister prior to being appointed as Governor.
- He was the Governor of the Reserve Bank of India for two terms.
- During his tenure, India weathered the Asian Crisis and has seen the consolidation of the gains of Liberalization and Economic Reforms.
- This period has seen a slew of measures to strengthen the banking sector, establish new institutions and introduce new instruments.
- The period has been characterized by the strengthening of the balance of payments and forex position, low inflation, and soft interest rates.
- During his tenure, the Indian Rupee note of 1000 denomination was introduced
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21Y. Venugopal Reddy (6 Sep 2003 – 5 Sep 2008)
- Yaga Venugopal Reddy is an Indian economist and a retired Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer of the 1964 batch belonging to the Andhra Pradesh cadre.
- In 2010, he was awarded India’s second-highest civilian honor, the Padma Vibhushan.
- He was the first to use the term “Financial Inclusion” in April 2005 in his Annual Policy Statement as Governor of the Reserve Bank of India.
- He banned the use of bank loans for the purchase of raw land, sharply curtailed securitizations, and derivatives, and essentially prohibited off-balance-sheet financing.
- Y. V. Reddy increased risk weightings on commercial buildings and shopping mall construction and increased bank reserve requirements.
22D. Subbarao (5 Sep 2008 – 4 Sep 2013)
- Subbarao was a Managing Director of Andhra Pradesh State Finance Corporation (1986-88) before being appointed as the Governor of RBI.
- He was noted for encouraging first-generation entrepreneurs to invest in industry and service sectors.
- He worked as a lead economist at the World Bank (1999-2004) where his work involved encouraging public expenditure reforms in developing countries.
- D. Subbarao also managed the World Bank’s flagship study on decentralization in East Asia.
- After stepping down from RBI, he was a Distinguished Visiting Fellow first at the National University of Singapore and later at the University of Pennsylvania.
23Raghuram Rajan (4 Sep 2013 – 4 Sep 2016)
- Between 2003 and 2006, Dr. Rajan was the Chief Economist and Director of Research at the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
- During his tenure at the RBI, he became the Vice-Chairman of the Bank for International Settlements.
- In 2003, Rajan received the inaugural Fischer Black Prize, given every two years by the American Finance Association to the financial economist younger than 40 who has made the most significant contribution to the theory and practice of finance.
- At the Federal Reserve’s annual Jackson Hole conference in 2005, Rajan warned about the growing risks in the financial system and proposed policies that would reduce such risks.
- During the financial crisis of 2007–2008, Rajan’s views came to be seen as prescient and he was extensively interviewed for the Academy Award-winning documentary Inside Job (2010).
- His book, Fault Lines: How Hidden Fractures Still Threaten the World Economy, won the Financial Times/Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year award in 2010.
24Urjit Patel (4 Sep 2016 – 10 Dec 2018)
- Urjit currently serves as Chairman of the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy, additional director of Britannia Industries, and independent director of John Cockerill India.
- After obtaining his Ph.D., Patel joined the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in 1990, where he worked on the US, India, Bahamas, and Myanmar desks till 1995.
- During his tenure, the Government of India demonetized the ₹500 and ₹1000 banknotes of the Mahatma Gandhi Series, with the stated intention of curbing corruption, black money, fake currency, and terrorism from 9 November 2016.
- Dr. Patel chaired the Expert Committee to Revise and Strengthen the Monetary Policy Framework. Representing India, he actively participated in steering the signing into force of the inter-governmental treaty and the Inter-Central Bank Agreement (ICBA) among the BRICS nations, which led to the establishment of the Contingent Reserve Arrangement (CRA), a swap line framework among the central banks of these countries.
- Dr. Patel has several publications in the areas of Indian macroeconomics, monetary policy, public finance, the Indian financial sector, international trade, and regulatory economics.
- He resigned from his post on 10 December 2018, being the first RBI governor to state personal reasons as a driving factor for resigning.
25Shaktikanta Das (12 Dec 2018 – Incumbent)
- Immediately after Shaktikanta Das was appointed as the Governor of the RBI, he was acting as a Member of the 15th Finance Commission and G20 Sherpa of India.
- Das has held important positions in the Central and State Governments in the areas of Finance, Taxation, Industries, Infrastructure, etc.
- During his long tenure in the Ministry of Finance, Government of India, he was directly associated with the preparation of as many as 8 Union Budgets.
- Shaktikanta has also served as India’s Alternate Governor in the World Bank, Asian Development Bank (ADB), New Development Bank (NDB), and Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).
- He has represented India in international fora like the IMF, G20, BRICS, SAARC, etc.
- He was conferred the ‘Central Banker of the Year, Asia-Pacific 2020’ award by the London-based magazine- The Banker for his efforts to make the banking system more robust.
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