Hyderabad: Bankers in the city are expecting cash crunch to end after Christmas as most of the small branches had got sufficient cash by Thursday.
This followed after bank employees’ and officers’ associations impressed upon the Reserve Bank of India the need to supply cash to the smaller branches in the city.
According to M.S. Kumar, secretary of Bank Employees Federation for A.P. and Telangana, the cash crunch at bigger branches still continues but small branches have received cash.
“Few branches insisted customers to withdraw lesser amount to clear the rush with at least some amount. We are expecting the situation will return to normalcy after Christmas,” he said.
He said that a majority of ATMs had been recalibrated in the city.
“From Wednesday even-ing, nodal branches started filling cash in the machines. Unfortunately, the crowd at ATMs led to no cash soon after filling it with currency. A majority ATMs in the city outskirts are now ready to serve customers. If the RBI takes the similar initiative, the crowd at ATMs will come down soon,” he said.
Explaining the rationale for ATMs being filled with cash in the evening, a bank official said the banks are giving preference to their customers as ATMs could be used by any customer.
“After serving their customers throughout the day, banks are filling ATMs with leftover cash in the evening,” he explained.
Apart from this, the official said the reason for replenishing ATMs in the evening is that this time is most convenient for employees.
Meanwhile, the All India Bank Employees and Officers Associations jointly decided to protest shortage of cash by holding demonstrations on December 28 followed by writing letters to Union finance minister Arun Jaitley on December 29, wearing protest badges on January 2 and by holding dharna at RBI offices in Mumbai and other state capitals on January 3.
