India to make US$1.1 billion SWAP facility successful for Sri Lanka   

India has pledged to provide the fullest support to expedite the US$1.1 billion special SWAP facility arrangement to be extended to Sri Lanka for the purpose of boosting dwindling foreign reserves in the country.
      
Under the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) framework on currency swap arrangement for SAARC countries for the period 2019 to 2022, RBI will offer swap arrangement within the overall corpus of $2 billion, Finance Ministry sources said. 

The currency swap facility is available to all SAARC member countries, subject to their signing the bilateral swap agreements and provides certain concessions for swap withdrawals in Indian Rupee

Central Bank Governor Prof. W.D. Lakshman held discussions on Tuesday July 14 with Acting Indian High Commissioner Vinod K. Jacob on the progress of the proposed special SWAP facility of $ 1.1 billion between the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the Central Bank of Sri Lanka. 

During this discussion, the Acting High Commissioner promised to provide the fullest support of the High Commission to make this arrangement successful while extending it expeditiously. 

Their discussions were also centered on Indo-Sri Lanka economic relationships.

Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has requested India to provide a special $1.1 billion currency swap facility to boost the country's draining foreign exchange reserves in view of the economic slowdown due to the coronavirus pandemic. 

The Presidential Secretariat noted in a statement that that the new Indian aid is in addition to the $400 million pledged for  Sri Lanka by  the Indian government under the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) framework. (BS)