M Patra pushed for rate hike at RBI's monetary policy review meet

But minutes of meeting show executive director voting for status quo

At its review of monetary policy earlier this month, the central bank's decision-making panel formally voted unanimously to keep rates unchanged but, before that, one member had urged the case for an increase.

Giving primacy to tackling inflation concerns, M Patra, executive director at the central bank and member of the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC), wanted a pre-emptive 25 basis points (bps) rise in the policy rate.

The minutes of the meeting, issued on Thursday, show all six members — three external and three from RBI — voting for the status quo. In the February review, the decision was to change the