Of course, Raghuram Rajan deserves to go

Raghuram Rajan deserves immediate termination. The RBI governor is "mentally not fully Indian" and has "willfully wrecked the economy". He is a disastrous disrupter of the Indian economy. These are the words of senior BJP leader and member of Parliament, Subramanian Swamy. And I agree with Swamy on this basic point: Raghuram Rajan must go. My reasons are different, even if one is common.

Rajan is popular.

According to a survey conducted by ETMarkets.com, 86 per cent readers who took part in it voted for a second term for Rajan as RBI governor when his term expires this September. Most popular politicians have problems winning a second term. He is not even a politician, not a populist policy purveyor either, yet people want to watch him speaking on TV.

It's sexist to say this but I have seen women go aww as he discusses India's monetary policy on business channels. His mug is all over newspapers. The politicians will feel uncomfortable when a guy who hasn't even addressed a mohalla rally in his life gets written about while people taking padyatras are written off.

Rajan talks sense.

Gone are the days when RBI governors were not seen. They were known by their signatures that promised to pay the bearer a sum of whatever rupees. Most of them were not camera-friendly and even if they were, they were not as photogenic as the present guv.

Since we have already discussed his handsomeness, we just need to reiterate that he has used that faculty to let the world know he possesses another faculty: critical thinking. The problem with people who think, is that they express their thoughts and piss people off.

Every time he is under pressure from the politicians to needlessly fiddle with interest rates, he not only does not listen to them, he lets the country know he knows his job. Good economics is bad politics, has he not heard that? How can economics prevail over politics? Why does he talk and talk sense to top that? He has to go, no?

Rajan is mentally not fully Indian.

I am not talking about his sharp suits, neither about his accent, which some find cute. The point here is the Indian ethos. This man has not yet given a single signal that he would indulge in petty politicking or serious games to make a weak rupee look strong. Being an economist, he must have some shady tricks up his sleeve but he refuses to show.

Almost at the end of his first term, the man continues to trust the Indian economy to pull itself out of the morass instead of declaring it already is out of the morass. He believes in competition and lacks jugaad skills.

The banking system has not collapsed under his watch, though the system has come under acute stress. What kind of a governor does that?

We have the President lawfully following the Union cabinet's advice and facing embarrassment of the Uttarakhand kind. Rajan, on the other hand, is not even a state's governor and doesn't show inclination to become one.

He is just a technocrat looking after our central bank. Still, no respect for central authority. In fact, no respect for authority at all.

Is there any doubt that this man is mentally not fully Indian?

Look at the political establishment and look at him. In a free-flowing frat party of finger-pointing politicos, this man sticks out like a sober thumb.

Somebody please get him out.