Demonetized currency back with the Bank, states RBI annual report

by Vandita Jadeja 2019-10-07 08:45:40

After the demonetization move which scrapped the Rs.500 and Rs.1000 notes, Rs.15.28 lakh crore are back with the bank.

The Reserve Bank of India revealed in its annual report that Rs.15.28 lakh crore or

99% of the Rs.15.44 lakh crore of the scrapped currency notes are back with the

Central bank. The Bank also stated that about 89 million units of the demonetized

Rs.1000 notes which amount to Rs.8900 crore have not come back to the system.

The report also added that the share of the newly introduced Rs.2000 crore notes in the total value of banknotes as at the end of March was a little higher than 50%. The Central Bank spent Rs.7, 965 crore on the printing of new currency notes in 2016-17 and said that the overall currency circulation into the system has come down by 20.2% on a year to year basis.

In the biggest ever demonetization exercise in India, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced that the high value currency notes will cease to be public tender. This move is aimed to bring an end to the circulation of black money and fake currency. The next few days saw queues at the bank branches in order to deposit and exchange the banknotes. With the increasing inconvenience faced by the people, this decision came under scrutiny. While there were several estimates, the official numbers were only revealed in the annual report which shows the impact of demonetization on the country.

The report also stated that 762,072 pieces of fake notes were detected in the banking system in the last year, which is a 20.4% increase over the previous year. Barring the Rs.100 note, the detection of fake notes had increased across the denominations of Rs.500 and Rs.1000. The RBI had launched a nationwide exercise post the announcement to estimate the density of the fake currency notes. After the verification by RBI of the fake currency notes, the Bank said that there were 2.4 pieces of Rs.500 denomination and 5.8 pieces of Rs.1000 denomination for every million pieces notes processed.