RBI Governor D Subbarao on Occupy Wall Street: Growth sans equity destabilising

MUMBAI: Reserve Bank Governor D Subbarao today said that the key message from the " Occupy Wall Street" movement is that growth itself can be destabilising if not accompanied by equity.

"Growth itself can be destabilising if it has no equity dimension...the elite cannot go on to do obscenely well even as the rest keep moving backwards," Subbarao said speaking to an audience comprising of bankers from across the globe at a seminar here.

The 'occupy' protests, despite their "amorphous nature and refusal to formulate a set of demands" have been able to strike a chord and spread the world over just because of that, he observed.

Interestingly, Subbarao's remarks come on a day when New York police raided the Zuccotti park, the ground zero for the anti-Wall Street protests, ordering protesters to leave the area or court arrest.

The movement which began at Zuccotti park in New York's Manhattan area in mid-September caught the attention of the rest of the world, particularly in the West which is reeling under an extended period of financial turbulences.

India had become the 83rd country internationally and Mumbai the 1501st city the world over, to witness the wave when a small group of people held protests at the Dalal Street earlier this month. However, the protestors were not able to strike a chord.