Gokarn vs Patel: Who will win the RBI race?

Moneycontrol BureauThe race for the new Reserve Bank governor has come down to two top in-house contenders - Urjit Patel and Subir Gokarn. Government sources on Wednesday said that the governor is likely to be announced this week itself.The current RBI governor Raghuram Rajan’s term is set to end on September 4, 2016. Initially, government sources had listed six possible names for the governor post including NITI Aayog Vice-chairman Arvind Pangariya and State Bank of India chief Arundhati Bhattacharya. Both Gokarn and Patel are familiar faces in the Reserve Bank. Here is a lowdown on both: Subir Gokarn

• He is currently serving as the Executive Director of the International Monetary Fund as well as Director- Research at Brookings Institution.
• Gokarn has served as deputy governor of RBI from November 2009 to January 2013.
• During his stint, Gokarn was in charge of monetary policy and has played a role in laying down the inflation-fighting strategy under the then governor D Subbarao.
• His past work profile includes credit analyst at Standard & Poor’s, executive director at CRISIL and Chief Economist at Center for Economic Research.
• The man is a specialist in macroeconomics with in-depth knowledge of macro parameters like inflation and GDP construct.
• Gokarn holds Masters in Economics from Delhi School of Economics and Doctorate in Economics from Case Western Reserve at Cleveland, Ohio.

• Born in 1963, Patel is currently the deputy governor at RBI and in charge of the monetary policy.
• Patel has strongly argued for fiscal discipline and is more cautious on liquidity. 
• He has served as a consultant to the Ministry of Power and Department of Economic Affairs from 1998-2001. Patel has also worked at the International Monetary Fund.
• Patel has also been Director of State Bank of India since February 2013 and headed the Urijit Patel Committee. 
• In 1996-1997, Patel was deputed from the IMF to central bank to advice on development of debt market, banking sector reforms, exchange rate and evolution of foreign exchange rate.
• He has authored various technical papers and notes on the macroeconomics, public finance, infrastructure as well as international trade.
• Patel holds a Ph.D (Economic) from the Yale University and M.Phil from Oxford.