Erode District Collector's humanitarian gesture to visually impaired couple

Coming to the aid of a visually impaired couple, a top district official on Monday gave them Rs 25,000 from his personal funds after they pleaded for help on learning that their savings were worthless, being in Rs 1,000 and Rs 500 notes demonetised nearly four years ago.

District Collector C Kathiravan gave Somu (58) and his wife Palaniammal, who eked out a living by selling incense sticks, a cheque for the amount, Rs 1,000 higher than the face value of the scrapped notes they had saved over ten years, official sources said.

Playing the role of a good Samaritan two days after Somu of Pothiya Moopanure village in the district made an appeal to the government for help, the Collector arranged a vehicle for them to come to his office and handed over the cheque, they said.

He directed officials to present the demonetised currency notes with a total face value of Rs 24,000 to the district Lead Bank for processing as per rules.

Somu and his wife thanked the Collector for his prompt response and gesture, official sources said.

Somu had said he came to know about the scrapping of the high-value currency notes in November, 2016 only on Friday when he took the savings to deposit in a bank so that they can utilise the interest to meet their requirements.

Since they could not make earnings in the last four months owing to COVID-19 lockdown, he had taken the cash, kept with his illiterate mother, to a bank for depositing when the officials there told him that the notes were demonetised.

He had said the money was saved by him and his wife over ten years from sale of incense sticks and camphor in nearby Anthiyur and surrounding areas.

All the three were not aware of the demonetisation of Rs 1,000 and Rs 500 currency notes, he had told reporters on Saturday.