Central bank wants to eliminate billions of demonetised notes quickly, but lacks the manpower

Holding a pile of billions of demonetised notes, the Reserve Bank of India has a problem - it is unable to destroy them quickly. In fact, at the current pace, the process could take nearly two years.

The RBI central office in Mumbai is keen to complete the task on a war footing, and wants to use the Army’s help for the job.

It has asked its regional offices to requisition the services of Army personnel, wherever necessary, through the central office. The help of soldiers is being sought due to the ‘sensitivity and secrecy’ required. “We could not have hired just any agency for this task,” a senior officer said.

As of March 31 last year, there were 15.7 billion ₹500 notes and 6.3 billion ₹1,000 currency notes in circulation, before demonetisation.

When the deadline for depositing the scrapped notes expired, 16.4 billion were with banks and the Reserve Bank of India. These masses of notes, now lying in 19 RBI offices, are being sorted, counted, verified and then sent to the shredder.

An RBI official said each of its offices has three or four shredders running at least two shifts a day, with five people assigned to each. The central bank has also hired shredders from private banks. Two senior officials do random checks and the exercise is monitored using CCTV cameras.

Not all RBI offices have enough manpower, the official said, explaining the quest for more hands.

Moreover, an initial count of the notes was done when they came in from banks, which is being followed up with random recounts.

“The government wanted to check again,” the official said, since the presence of fake currencies was strongly suspected. The shredding is thus being done only after verification.

The Centre advised the central bank to count the notes a second time to ascertain the actual number of demonetised notes that came back. The RBI has not confirmed how much money returned.

Most invalid notes were deposited, and RBI’s annual report for 2015-16 says fake notes are a small fraction of the total.