India keeps interest rates unchanged

India's central bank kept key interest rates steady on Tuesday in a widely anticipated move less than a week before the start of national elections. After a meeting in the financial capital Mumbai, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said the benchmark repo rate, at which it lends to commercial banks, would remain at 8.0 percent. "At the current juncture, it is appropriate to hold the policy rate, while allowing the rate increases undertaken during September 2013-January 2014 to work their way through the economy," RBI governor Raghuram Rajan wrote in his statement. The RBI last raised rates on January 28, the third hike since September last year as part of its battle against high inflation, according to AFP.