Salaries credited, banks run out of cash

Several banks in the city – private and public - ran out of cash by Wednesday afternoon as people queued-up to withdraw salaries deposited into their accounts. “Compared to the past few days, there was more crowd in the banks on Wednesday as people came to withdraw their salaries. We ran out of cash by around 3 pm,” said an employee of public sector bank in Egmore. Many small branches of public and private sector banks too met the same fate as disappointed customers left for home empty handed. In some banks, such as Indian Overseas Bank in Anna Nagar, the cash ran out in just two hours. “While there was a lot of crowd, we could handle the situation as government staff were paid cash in advance,” said the manager of another nationalised bank in Vepery.  However, the All India Bank Officers’ Confederation (AIBOC) claimed that the Reserve Bank of India has been favouring scheduled banks viz a viz nationalised banks in disbursing funds.  At a press meet held here, AIBOC – Tamil Nadu unit claimed that the cash flow in public banks was extremely insufficient to meet their daily needs. 

“According to the information that we have received, three private sector banks in TN alone has received Rs 6,600 crore in the last 20 days whereas over 27 public-sector banks together have received only Rs 7,700 crore,” says R Sekaran, State Secretary (AIBOC), assuring the numbers have come from trusted sources. It’s the beginning of the month and it’s the time when pensions and salaries have to be paid. “On an average, the branch of a bank must have 1.5 crore to transact but now most banks have just about Rs 20 lakh. This is just not enough and is likely to create chaos on December 1,” says Sekaran.

Long queues and irritated customers continued to be seen outside ATM. “When I went to the bank, they said there wasn’t enough money. After searching for half-an-hour, I found this ATM that was dispensing money. I have to pay my staff, who insisted that I pay in cash. With a cap on withdrawal, I will not be able to pay all of them. I have offered to help them with their bills through online transaction,” says Ashish Jain, a businessman. Shikha, another working professional says, “I had to stand in the line for over an hour to get the money after the salary was credited.

To check the misuse of Jan Dhan accounts by black money hoarders, Reserve Bank has restricted the withdrawal from such accounts to Rs 10,000 per month.

“With a view to protect the innocent farmers and rural account holders of Pradhan Mantri JanDhan Yojana from activities of money launders and legal consequences under the Benami Property Transaction and Money Laundering laws, it has been decided to place certain limits, as a matter of precaution, on the operations in such accounts funded through deposits of Specified Bank Notes after November 9, 2016,” the RBI on Wednesday said in a notification, terming it as temporary measures. According to it, fully KYC-complaint Jan Dhan account holders will be allowed to withdraw Rs 10,000 per month from their account, while limited or Non-KYC compliant account holders can withdraw Rs 5,000 per month. 

It, however, said branch managers may allow further withdrawals beyond Rs 10,000 a month within the current applicable limits only after ascertaining the genuineness of such withdrawals and duly documenting the same on bank’s record. With regard to deposits, Jan Dhan account holders have a limit of Rs 50,000. In the wake of the Centre’s demonetisation drive, Jan Dhan accounts have seen a massive rise in deposits, in many cases to the extent of Rs 49,000. There have been reports that the bank accounts of people, mainly in rural areas, who had zero balance till the announcement of scrapping of high value currency notes, have been witnessing sudden surge in deposits. The government suspects that black money hoarders are using the farmers and other people’s Jan Dhan accounts to deposit their ill-gotten money so that they can safely convert that money into white. Deposits in Jan Dhan accounts soared sharply by around Rs 27,200 crore in just 14 days after the announcement of ban on old Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency notes.