RBI governor to make unscheduled speech at 10am as Covid devastates India

Central bank had last year announced a series of measures to support the economy suffering the impact of a nationwide lockdown

Reserve Bank of India Governor Shaktikanta Das will make an unscheduled speech at 10 am today, Wednesday, as a new coronavirus wave threatens a nascent economic recovery.

The address will be broadcast at 10am local time, the RBI said on Twitter. It didn’t elaborate.

A team at the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore used a mathematical model to predict about 404,000 deaths will occur by June 11 if current trends continue. A model from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington forecast 1,018,879 deaths by the end of July, Bloomberg reported.

India on Tuesday recorded 33,491 new coronavirus cases to take its count to 3,447,133. With 3,449 new fatalities, its Covid-19 death toll reached 222,408.

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi has said the central government should impose a "full lockdown" to slow down the coronavirus wave but protect the poor with a guaranteed minimum income scheme.