Pranab plays down Dubai crisis
The debt crisis in Dubai will not affect India much but the government is keeping a close watch and will act to prevent any fallout, finance minister Pranab Mukherjee said on Saturday. While admitting that an adverse effect was seen on the stock markets on Friday, Mukherjee said what insulated India was the limited exposure of the country’s banking to financial systems in Dubai. 'The full impact of the Dubai debt crisis is yet to be assessed, but there is no need to press the panic button,' Mukherjee told reporters on the sidelines of a function here. To draw his point, he pointed out that 'first of all, the amount is small, and secondly, the exposure of our banking systems to the Dubai financial systems is limited.'