Soiled notes sent to RBI for destruction stage a comeback
Chennai: The All India Bank Officers Confederation, TN, has demanded the RBI to spell out the roadmap for future in the wake of demonetisation initiative and also sought to know why the secretary finance or secretary department of financial services has not issued any press statements and why Sashikanta Das, secretary, economic affairs was issuing statements post Nov.8 Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s announcement.
Contending that the shortage of currency following demonetisation has affected all except the corporates, AIBOC-TN president D. Thomas Franco Rajendra Dev and its general secretary R. Sekaran, said RBI should publish details of currency distributed to different banks date wise from Oct. 1, 2016, provide details of currency available with the banking system after demonetisation besides clarify the position on black money and counterfeit notes.
The most urgent need is to reach cash to all the bank branches to disburse pension and salaries, they added. The confederation also urged the Centre to scrutinise the transactions on cash of corporates like Adani, Ambani and others from April 1, 2016.
Meanwhile, the All India Bank Employees Association (AIBEA) and All India Bank Officers Association (AIBOA) have urged the Indian Banks’ Association (IBA) Chairman Rajeev Rishi to prevail upon the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and ensure adequate supply of currency notes to all banks without any discrimination.
AIBEA General Secretary Ch Venkatachalam and AIBOA General Secretary S. Nagarajan said in a letter to Mr. Rishi that there was acute shortage of '100 currency notes. Whatever '100 notes are being supplied by RBI are found to be very soiled ones earlier remitted to RBI as non-issuable. “Customers are refusing to accept these dirty and soiled notes and in fact it is found to be health hazard for the cash counter staff who handle these soiled notes,” they said.
C. P. Krishnan, general secretary of Bank Employees Federation of India (BEFI), Tamil Nadu, claimed that it was impossible to sort out the shortfall in currency following the withdrawal of high value denominations, within 50 days as stated by the Centre and RBI. It may get sorted in April 2017.