Long queue outside RBI Chandigarh branch to deposit, exchange Rs 2,000 notes

Chandigarh [India]: A long queue was seen outside the RBI’s regional office in Chandigarh, with people coming from far and wide from Himachal Haryana and Punjab to exchange their Rs 2000 notes.

After commercial banks stopped accepting Rs 2000 banknotes, people have now started lining up in 19 offices of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to exchange their high-denomination notes.

The last day for the public to avail of exchange or to deposit high-value Rs 2000 banknotes at the banks was Saturday (October 7).

As per the latest Reserve Bank of India data, only about Rs 10,000 crore (or less than 3 per cent) of the currency notes remained in circulation. This essentially meant over 97 per cent of the total value of Rs 2,000 banknotes were back in the banking system.

The total value of Rs 2000 banknotes in circulation was Rs 3.56 lakh crore at the close of business on May 19, 2023 – the date on which RBI decided to withdraw the banknote.

The window for deposit and or exchange of the Rs 2,000 banknotes continues to be available at the 19 issue offices of RBI.

Those 19 RBI Issue Offices are in Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Belapur, Bhopal, Bhubaneswar, Chandigarh, Chennai, Guwahati, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Jammu, Kanpur, Kolkata, Lucknow, Mumbai, Nagpur, New Delhi, Patna and Thiruvananthapuram.

Members of the public are also requested to avail the facility of sending the Rs 2,000 banknotes through post offices of India Post.

September 30 was initially decided as the last date for the purpose of completing the exchange and deposit exercise in a time-bound manner and to provide adequate time to the public. People were requested to utilise the month of September to deposit or exchange their Rs 2000 banknotes to avoid any rush at the last moment.

On September 30, RBI, based on a review, decided to extend the arrangement for deposit and exchange till October 7, 2023.

The Rs 2000 denomination banknote was introduced in November 2016, primarily to meet the currency requirement of the economy in an expeditious manner after the withdrawal of the legal tender status of all Rs 500 and Rs 1000 banknotes in circulation at that time.

The objective of introducing Rs 2000 banknotes was met once banknotes in other denominations became available in adequate quantities. Therefore, the printing of Rs 2000 banknotes was stopped in 2018-19.