Are Indians learning to keep their currency notes properly?
2 Apr, 2013According to information provided by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to an applicant who filed an application under the Right to Information Act, it has been revealed that in the last eight years, 22,22,29,870 notes were deposited with the RBI for being unusable or soiled. 26 offices of RBI across the country have machinery to destroy the notes.
As per information provided to Manoranjan Roy, the maximum number of notes have been of Rs.10/- denomination and between the financial year 2004-05 and 2011-12, the RBI destroyed 7.85 crore notes of Rs.10/- denomination. The information shows that the number of soiled or unusable notes coming to RBI is decreasing over a period of time.
- 2008-09 - 4,30,22,090 notes came to the RBI,
- 2009-10 - 2,58,96,880 notes came to the RBI,
- 2010-11 - 1,51,14,641 notes came to the RBI,
- 2011-12 - 1,23,82,200 notes came to the RBI.
RBI spokesperson Alpana Kilawala stated that she would not be able to comment now on the reason behind the reduction in the number of soiled notes coming for exchange. The experts have pointed that the reasons for the reduction in the number of notes coming to the RBI for exchange are many and include:
- People are taking care better care of the notes, specially of higher denomination and
- RBI is not printing small denomination notes in large quantity. The smaller denomination notes have lesser life as they are circulated frequently.