80:20 scheme was launched to create jobs, says Rajan

Breaking his silence over the PNB fraud, former RBI governor Raghuram Rajan on Tuesday said that “before we assign blame, we have to know what really happened”.

“We need to look into how the PNB scam occurred and how the lapses happened," the former governor said in a TV interview. Rajan's name was dragged after the BJP launched a scathing attack at former finance minister P Chidambaram for clearing a gold scheme days before the new government was to take charge at the Centre.

"The time when this happened, the gold industry was running into losses. There was an argument that a lot of workers were laid off due to the shortage of gold," he said. "I don't know what the rationale was. The Department of Trade in Commerce Ministry has a criterion to issue star trading houses premium trading houses licences. The whole objective was to bring down the premium that had built up due to constraints in the supply."