Starting April 2016, the government began fixing interest rates on its small savings schemes every quarter, instead of annually, to align them to market rates. The quarterly resetting of small savings rates is based on a formula which dictates a spread of 25-100 basis points over the yield on government securities of similar maturity. However, the politically sensitive nature of these instruments has rendered the mechanism useless, with the government not making any changes to small savings rates for nearly two years despite a fall in market rates. According to the Reserve Bank of India, small savings rates are currently 42-168 basis points higher than what they should be.