Add the deposits of old currency (Rs 8.45 lakh crore) to the invalidated currency with banks and it’s clear – in the first three weeks since Prime Minister Modi announced the war on black money, 59 percent of the cancelled currency is already back with the banking system.

If a large part of the remaining 41 percent comes back by December-end, questions will be raised about whether the demonetisation exercise was worth the short term pain.

There are, of course, gaps in this rationale.

For one, those holding unaccounted cash could find means to deposit money without being detected. An example of this is the surge in deposits in Jan Dhan accounts. Rs 27,000 crore was deposited in these accounts in the first two weeks after demonetisation, suggesting that there may be distribution of unaccounted deposits across these accounts.

Second, the government on Monday announced another income disclosure scheme. This scheme allows citizens to deposit unaccounted cash in return for effective tax and penalties equal to 50 percent of the undisclosed income, while another 25 percent would be locked-in for four years. For any one availing this scheme, the tax department will not question the source of this income, said Hasmukh Adhia, revenue secretary, government of India.

Factors such as these may allow a part of the unaccounted deposits to come into the banking system and prevent a clear assessment of how much black money in cash there was to begin with and whether the demonetisation exercise has managed to snuff out a part of it.