Inflation control measures like sucking excess money out of the economy and the robust GDP growth cannot go hand in hand, Finance Minister P Chidambaram said on Wednesday.
"You cannot have both," Chidambaram said in the Rajya Sabha during the debate on price rise issue.
The finance minister's remarks came when senior BJP leader Murli Manohar Joshi countered P J Kurien (Congress) saying tightening of money supply would impact growth.
Kurien was defending the government on the issue of price rise stating the Reserve Bank has revised eight times the Cash Reserve Ratio to suck the liquidity so as to control inflation.
Chidambaram has recently stated that if GDP growth was to be sacrificed by some margin, the government would not mind it for controlling inflation.
The RBI is due to announce the annual credit policy on April 29 and economists are expecting hike in the CRR in the wake of inflation touching a three-year high of 7.41 per cent, bringing the government under political and public pressure.
