Mumbai: A rare public spat has surfaced between two of India’s largest financial institutions, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the State Bank of India (SBI), after allegations of plagiarism in economic research reports sparked an online debate about integrity and originality in professional analysis.
RBI Economist Flags “Copied” Content
The controversy began when RBI economist Sarthak Gulati took to LinkedIn during Diwali, alleging that SBI’s flagship research report, Ecowrap, had lifted sections from the RBI’s Monetary Policy Reports (MPRs) without due attribution. Gulati shared screenshots showing what he described as “striking similarities” in language, structure, and visuals between the two publications.
He claimed that parts of the July 2025 Ecowrap mirrored Chapter 2: Price and Cost from the April 2025 RBI MPR, including charts, key narratives, and analysis boxes that are typically used by the central bank to highlight original insights. Gulati further alleged that the October 2025 Ecowrap also closely resembled the RBI’s October 2025 MPR, suggesting a pattern of replication.
Emphasizing the importance of integrity in economic research, Gulati wrote, “Our profession depends on originality and proper attribution. Verbatim replication without acknowledgment undermines the credibility of economic research institutions.”
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SBI Research Team Refutes Allegations
In response, the SBI research team strongly denied the plagiarism claims, calling them “sensational and unfounded.” Ecowrap is led by Soumya Kanti Ghosh, Group Chief Economic Adviser at SBI and a member of both the Finance Commission and the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council.
Team member Tapas Parida defended the report’s authenticity through a series of LinkedIn posts, arguing that overlaps are inevitable since economic researchers often rely on common datasets and similar themes. “Our analyses are independent and clearly cite data sources such as RBI, NSO, and SBI Research,” he stated.
Parida also addressed Gulati’s claim about “spatial price convergence,” saying that while the RBI’s study used multi-year data, SBI’s version was a short-term inflation analysis capturing recent economic disruptions. He maintained that the Ecowrap’s mention of β-convergence was based on established global research and not copied material.
He further clarified that both institutions used data from MOSPI (Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation), and SBI’s October issue acknowledged RBI as a data source, sharing documentation to substantiate the claim.
Call for Dialogue, Not Division
Parida ended his response with a quote from Sufi poet Rumi: “Raise your words, not voice. It is rain that grows flowers, not thunder.” He emphasized that repetition of meaningful ideas in economics should be seen as “shared intellectual space, not plagiarism.”
He added that SBI Research promotes collaboration, open debate, and the exchange of ideas to enhance the quality of policy analysis. “Healthy discussions strengthen research integrity and contribute to India’s progress,” Parida concluded.
While neither the RBI nor SBI has issued an official institutional statement, the incident has reignited discussions within India’s academic and financial community about intellectual property, citation practices, and research ethics, especially in an era where public and private institutions increasingly share the same data sources.