Finance Minister Arun Jaitley not to attend IMF-World Bank meetings

NEW DELHI: Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, who was discharged from AIIMS today, has decided not to attend the annual meetings of IMF and World Bank in Washington later this week and his place will be taken by Finance Secretary Arvind Mayaram.

"Finance Secretary Arvind Mayaram will leave for US today to attend the annual meetings of IMF and World Bank," a senior ministry official said on the Fund-Bank meetings from October 10 to 12.

Jaitley, who has been recovering from a surgery, returned home today and will attend office in the next few days.

The annual meetings of IMF and World Bank take stock of the global economic situation and try to build a consensus on future course of action to deal with the issues. Besides, the long-pending issue of quota reforms will also come up for deliberations.

Reserve Bank of India Governor Raghuram Rajan and Deputy Governor Urjit Patel will also attend the IMF and World Bank annual plenary meetings.

Earlier this year in July, IMF had lowered global growth forecast for 2014 to 3.4 per cent, below its April forecast of 3.7 per cent.