Record inflows of over $1.5 billion saw India's foreign exchange reserves cross $102.1 billion for the week ended January 2, 2004.

The reserves rose by $1.513 billion due to inflows, foreign exchange remittances, dollar revaluation vis-à-vis other foreign currencies and during the period under review stood at $102.103 billion, the Reserve Bank of India's weekly statistical supplement released in Mumbai on Saturday said.

This is the third time during the past four weeks when foreign exchange reserves had swelled by more than $1billion each week.

The foreign currency assets also increased by $1.336 billion to stand at $97.885 billion, the central bank said.

Gold reserves went up by $177 million to $4.215 million mainly due to revaluation while special drawing rights remained static at $3 million.

India's Reserve Tranche Position with the International Monetary Fund grew by $10 million to $1.316 billion RBI said adding, the RTP may change from time to time due to India's transactions with the International Monetary Fund as well as changes in SDR (special drawing rights) exchange rates vis-a-vis rupee and the dollar.

Loans and advances to central government continue to be at a nil balance while that to state governments declined by Rs 910 crore (Rs 9.10 billion) to Rs 5,876 crore (R 58.76 billion) during this period.

Aggregate deposits of scheduled commercial banks for the fortnight ending December 26 grew by Rs 9,844 crore (0.7 per cent) to Rs 14,19,788 crore (Rs 14.197 trillion).

Bank credit increased by Rs 10,204 crore (Rs 102.04 billion) at Rs 7,80,572 crore (Rs 7,805.72 billion).