Friday, 12 Sep, 2025
Rupee has been falling steadily against the dollar since 2014 despite some modest recoveries on occasion.
During its last two years, the UPA regime faced flak from opposition parties, apart from the media and large sections of the population for various alleged scams, poor governance and policy paralysis. It did result in the Congress crashing from 206 seats to 44 seats in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. One of charges against the hapless UPA regime was its seeming inability to control the fall of the value of the Rupee against the US dollar. Now, the Congress, which is in opposition since 8 years and the BJP led NDA regime is in its last two years of the second term is returning the favour. Many Congress leaders, apart from media ad large sections of the population are mocking the government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the same. The upper has fallen to a record low of 78.50 against the dollar in late June, 2022. This is despite the Reserve Bank of India selling dollars worth about $ 40 billion and depleting foreign exchange reserves to prop up the Rupee. While supporters of the current government say the decline in the fall of the Rupee is inevitable given the global economic situation, the critics would have none of it and blame the government for the declining values.
According to data, the US dollar has appreciated against every major currency in the world. But then politics and perceptions are what they are. As the accompanying chart shows, the Rupee has been falling steadily against the dollar since 2014 despite some modest recoveries on occasion.
C Voter-India Tracker conducted a nationwide survey to find out what ordinary Dian’s not very familiar with economics and capital flows felt about the issue. The responses reveal that the value of the Rupee against the dollar is actually a political issue. Overall, more than three out of every four Indians in the survey asserted that they were concerned and worried about the fall in the value of the Rupee. Quite predictably, 83% of opposition supporters stated that they were concerned and worried. But surprisingly, even 69% of NDA supporters were of the opinion that this was indeed a matter of concern and worry. Normally, one would expect low income and rural Dian’s to not be very perturbed by the issue as most of them struggle for daily livelihoods. But even they had apprehensions. Almost 80% of low income Indians stated that they were concerned and worried about the fall of the Rupee. Similarly, 78.5% of respondents from rural India shared the same sentiment.
Clearly, the current regime has not just an economic “problem”, but also a political issue to tackle.
