India's foreign exchange reserves showed a dip for the first time in several weeks after the government repaid $3.04 billion of loans in advance to multilateral agencies in the last week of February.

The reserves decreased by $2.48 billion to $72.88 billion in the week ended February 28, according to data released Saturday by the Reserve Bank of India.

In the week ended February 21, India's forex reserves had been an all time high of $75.45 billion.

"The variation in foreign currency assets during the week of February 28 includes the effect of purchases of $3.04 billion by the government from RBI for prepayment of foreign currency loans from the Asian Development Bank and the World Bank," the central bank stated.

Break up of the data reveals that the foreign currency assets during the week fell by $2.51 billion to $69.15 billion, while the value of gold reserves gained by $37 million due to prevailing high global price to reach $3.73 billion.

The special drawing rights, however, remained static at $4 million.

Agencies