New Delhi, Feb. 4 -- Now that the budget for 2025-26 is done, if not entirely dusted, all eyes turn to Mint Street for the three-day meeting of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Monetary Policy Committee (MPC). It will be the rate-setting panel's first under the chairmanship of RBI Governor Sanjay Malhotra. It comes amid speculation that the budget's consumption push will get another boost through monetary easing. Monetary and fiscal policy, it is said, are joined at the hip. There are two ways of interpreting this.

The first is that one blindly follows the other. The other is that each takes its cue from the other. The nuance here is that it is informed, but not driven, by the other. Of course, there could be a crisis, like covid, when bo...