RBI to Transfer Record ₹2.87 Trillion Surplus To Govt, CRB Buffer Set Lower at 6.5%

The Central Board of Directors of the Reserve Bank of India today approved a record surplus transfer of ₹2.87 trillion to the Central Government for the accounting year 2025-26, according to a release by the central bank. This follows a transfer of ₹2.69 trillion in 2024-25. The latest amount is in line with the lower range of the ₹2.8 trillion-₹3.4 trillion expected by economists.

The Central Board lowered the contingent risk buffer at 6.50%. Last year, the RBI central board has raised the Contingent Risk Buffer to 7.50% after the risk provisioning under the Contingent Risk Buffer under the revised framework was set at 4.50-7.50% of the RBI’s balance sheet. 

This is first time the RBI board has lowered the Contingent Risk Buffer from the preceding year as percentage of the size of the Balance Sheet.

The RBI’s balance Sheet expanded by 20.61% on year to ₹91.97 trillion as on March 31, 2026. However, the RBI board decided to transfer ₹1.09 trillion towards the CRB for 2025-26 as against ₹448.62 billion in the previous year.

A back-of-the-envelope calculation shows, lowering of Contingent Risk Buffer level to 6.5%, has resulted in increase in surplus amount by around ₹920 billion.

The central bank bought ₹8.8 trillion of government securities during 2025-26.

The gross income of the RBI increased by 26.42% over the previous year while the expenditure before risk provisions increased by 27.60%. The net income, before risk provision and transfer to statutory funds, aggregated ₹3.96 trillion in 2025-26 as against ₹3.13 trillion in 2024-25.

Treasury gains from foreign exchange transactions likely to be moderate in 2025-26. Gross dollar sales by the RBI fell sharply to about $166 billion in 2025-26 till February, compared with $399 billion in 2024-25, largely because the central bank entered the year with an already elevated forward dollar book.

A higher surplus pay out this year will help the government in funding the fiscal deficit and is expected to improve liquidity conditions. The Budget for the current year has projected ₹3.16 trillion from the RBI surplus and dividend from public sector financial institutions.

The surplus transfer of ₹2.87 trillion accounts for 16.90% of the fiscal deficit of ₹16.96 trillion in 2026-27. The surplus transfer had accounted for 17.23% of the revised fiscal deficit of ₹15.58 trillion in 2025-26.