The government is now focusing on printing 500 rupee notes, Economic Affairs Secretary Shaktikanta Das said today, hours before a deadline for using old 500 and 1000 rupee notes at petrol pumps and some other facilities ends.
From midnight to December 30, old notes can only be deposited in banks. Prime Minister Narendra Modi had on November 8 banned the high value notes to combat black money and money laundering and has since aggressively pitched transitioning to a cashless economy.
Out of two lakh twenty thousand ATMs in the country about two lakh have already been calibrated to dispense the new 2,000 and 500 rupee notes. To promote digital payments post demonetisation, the government has today announced big cash prices of a total Rs. 340 crore for consumers and merchants beginning December 25, Christmas Day.
Starting December 25, 15,000 people will win Rs. 1,000 each for 100 days and 7,000 weekly awards will be announced. For consumers, there will mega awards of Rs. 1 crore, Rs. 50 lakh and Rs. 25 lakh in a big draw on April 14, the birth anniversary of Dalit icon BR Ambedkar. Merchants will get prizes of Rs. 50 lakh, Rs. 25 lakh and Rs. 5 lakh.
It is estimated that only five per cent Indians make digital payments. Mr Kant said in a month after November 8 when the cash ban was announced, point of sale transactions or payments using card swipe machines have seen a jump of 95 per cent. Only transactions made through the government issued RuPay Cards, the UPI (Unified Payment Interface), USSD (Unstructured Supplementary Service Data), and Aadhar-Enabled Payment Systems will be eligible for the lucky draws. Mr Kant said the scheme will not cover those who use private credit cards and e-wallets of private companies.
At his press conference Mr Das said to address hardship caused to people by the massive cash crunch that has followed the notes ban, new notes are being airlifted wherever necessary to ensure a continuous supply.
The focus he said was on identifying rural areas where there is a shortage of cash. The situation, he said, was improving constantly. Initially, Mr Das said, 2,000 rupee notes were circulated aggressively to replenish more money at the earliest, but now the focus was on printing the new 500 rupee notes.He said three times the normal yearly supply of lower denomination notes of Rs.100, 50, 20 and 10 have been supplied in the last five weeks.
The Reserve Bank of India, he said, has infused more than 5 trillion rupees ($73.66 billion) in new currency notes into the banking system since November 8. This is a fraction of the 15.44 trillion rupees in 500 and 1,000-rupee notes that were circulating before PM abolished them last month.
