RBI DEPR Interview Transcript : Sanjana Sejwal

Hi. I am Sanjana Sejwal and I have secured AIR – 1 in RBI DEPR 2023 Exam. I have completed B.A. (H) Economics from Kamla Nehru College and M.A. Economics (2022) from Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi. In this blog post, I am sharing my interview transcript for the benefit of all future aspirants.

Name : Sanjana Sejwal

Interview duration : 20 mins

Interview score : 61/75

INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT

There were a total 6 members in the panel (5 Male + 1 Female)

Chairman : 1) Welcome Sanjana. Please be seated. (Looking at DAF / Biodata). So, you are currently working at Accenture. Please tell us about your job profile. Are you proficient in python?

A1) I briefly explained my job as a Data Science analyst and the nature of my work. And told him, yes that I have good working knowledge of Python.

Male Member 1:

• Can you please tell me what is higher for longer interest rates that are in newspapers recently?
• Why has RBI held the repo rate constant?
• Do you agree with the current decision of MPC on stance and repo rate

 Ans: Framed my answer from current MPC meeting minutes talking about how rate cut at this point could de-anchor inflationary expectations. He nodded in affirmative and passed on the other member

Male Member 2:

• What is crowding out effect?
• Can increase in government expenditure also sometimes lead to crowding in of private investment? When?

Female Member:

• Have you seen the RBI’s balance sheet? – Yes
• Can you mention exact items? – I said no but told her that I could tell the broad heads under assets and liabilities. She asked me to recount. I told her and she was happy with the response
• Any risk that is presented by RBI’s balance sheet to itself? – Forex risk

Male member 3:

• Do you know why China is slowing down?  – Overinvestment, slowing exports, ageing population
• Can you explain the phrase “ Japanification of the Chinese economy” – I was not able to pick up on the first pass so the chairman intervened and asked me to talk in terms of demographics – that is the ageing of the Chinese population. From there on, good discussion picked up

Male member 4:

• Comfortable with econometrics? Aware about VAR MODEL? – Said no
• Which econometric methodology have you used in your job? – I used OLS in one of my projects. I explained that
• Financial conglomerates – I couldn’t answer this one. So passed on to next member

Male member 5:

• Do you know about DSIBs? Told about them
• What parameters are used to classify banks as D-SIB? (Was in news recently)

Male member 6:

• Tell me again the components of the balance sheet?
• Largest component of RBI’s balance sheet? – Currency in circulation and I also quoted the exact figure for the same from RBI’s Annual Report in % terms and he seemed pretty impressed with that.

Then they told me, your interview is over. You can leave now.

All in all the interview was a good experience. Panel members were smiling and laughing in between to keep the environment cordial. There were a few questions where I fumbled but the panel did help me pick up and connect the dots. Just be confident and quoting figures can be a plus point.