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Transcript of Statement made by Shri R. Gandhi, Deputy Governor

Vidyut

The RBI had originally placed the transcript of Shri R. Gandhi and Shri S. S. Mundra, RBI Deputy Governors brief Agencies on Currency Issues on their website. At that time, James Wilson, who has been diligently tracking the numbers of demonetisation had raised questions about the numbers of currency given out.

Subsequently, the transcript in question was removed.

This was verified by me. The statement had been removed. You can check this yourself on the RBI website. A sanitized version of what he said was later put up by the RBI (on the 13th Dec 2016) as an “edited transcript” of Shri R. Gandhi and Shri S. S. Mundra, RBI Deputy Governors brief Agencies on Currency Issues with the controversial part removed (correction: it was a new statement). However, nothing dies on the internet. Producing here the original transcript that the RBI had published and the original url it had been published on. It remains removed. Parts in tialics are emphasized by me – these were the ones highlighted by James Wilson when he commented on the statement.

Transcript of Statement made by Shri R. Gandhi, Deputy Governor

There have been several questions about the decision to withdraw the legal tender status of the ₹ 1000 and the old series of ₹ 500 notes.

The motivations for the decision are to deal with the problem of high quality counterfeit notes in these denominations and unearth black money that may be held in cash. The decision has not been taken in haste but after detailed deliberations. There had to be a high level of secrecy surrounding this decision and the fact is that such a large country was indeed taken by surprise when the decision was announced. The Reserve Bank and the Central Government were conscious of certain immediate difficulties that the public at large could face and all efforts were made to minimise them and mitigate them. The problems of the common persons were at the top of the policy makers’ radar and all dispensations were calibrated to address them without at the same time jeopardising the achievement of the larger policy objectives.

The Reserve Bank and the Central Government run note presses are working to their full capacity and all efforts are being made to reach the notes to every part of the country. In fact during this period (from 10th November 2016 to 5th December 2016), the Reserve Bank has supplied to the public banknotes of various denominations worth ₹ 3.81 trillion.

As regards lower denomination notes of ₹ 100, ₹ 50, ₹ 20 and ₹ 10, the Reserve Bank, over its counters and through bank branches all over the country, has supplied 19.1 billion pieces of denominations in this period. (₹ 100 – 8.5 billion, ₹ 50 – 1.8 billion, ₹ 20 – 3.1 billion and ₹ 10 – 5.7 billion). This is more than what the Reserve Bank had supplied to the public in the whole of last three years.

We reiterate that there is adequate supply of notes and hoarding of notes helps nobody’s cause. We also strongly advocate the public to switch to digital payment modes given that there are several options, there are adequate safeguards and there is an increasing acceptability of this mode of payment by a large number of recipients.

It was originally published on the following url: https://rbi.org.in/Scripts/bs_viewcontent.aspx?Id=3286 and may still be verified against Google’s cache while it remains cached. However, I have saved it here now, to ensure that it does not vanish again.

It is extremely concerning that the RBI can simply delete official data released and statements made on whim from their records. If there are inaccuracies or problems, they should be corrected, not sneakily be taken off the records. RBI has already shaken the public’s trust in the money and its ability to manage money. It does not bode well if the RBI”s word cannot be trusted either.

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