After Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes were demonetised, the poor have been enjoying sound sleep, whereas the rich have been running from pillar to post to buy sleeping pills, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Monday. He also asserted that there was no dearth of currency in the country, saying that the real problem lay in where the money really is, referring to the black money market.
The prime minister made the statement in Ghazipur, where he inaugurated a number of railway projects. Here, Modi also lambasted Opposition parties for questioning the government’s demonetisation move, and said that black money hoarders were nervous. His remarks come a day after he appealed to the country to bear with the inconvenience of having to exchange the scrapped Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes at banks and post offices.
“Congress imposed Emergency and turned the country into a prison for 19 months just to save Indira Gandhi’s parliamentary seat. It also demonetised the 25 paise coin without asking anyone,” he said, adding the Centre needed to end the flow of counterfeit notes from “the enemy” that have been funding militant activities in India.
Earlier on Monday, Secretary of Economic Affairs Shaktikanta Das said ATMs will begin to dispense the new Rs 2,000 note by Monday or Tuesday. A large number of micro-ATMs will also be deployed across India, he said. “The focus of the government is to activate all channels whereby cash is dispensed to the public,” the economic secretary said, reiterating the call to not panic as “enough cash will be available” in the coming days.
Late on Sunday, the Centre had pushed the last date for government hospitals, petrol stations and toll booths to accept the scrapped Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 tenders till November 24. It had raised the ATM withdrawal limit from Rs 2,000 to Rs 2,500, but only for recalibrated ATMs. In addition to also increasing the weekly cash withdrawal limit from Rs 20,000 to Rs 24,000, the Finance Ministry had advised all banks to arrange for mobile banking vans at major hospitals to be available for patients during emergencies.
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