50% of Rs 2,000 notes have been returned so far, says RBI

The RBI disclosed today that 50 percent of the Rs 2,000 notes in circulation have come back in the first. The total value of the notes that have been returned so far works out Rs 1.82 lakh crore.

RBI governor Shaktikanta Das said 85% of these notes have come back as bank deposits. The announcement of the withdrawal of the 2000 rupee currency notes was made on May 19 and the last date for exchanging these notes or depositing them in banks is September 30.

The Rs 2,000 currency note was introduced in November 2016 primarily to quickly meet the currency requirement of the economy after the sudden demonetisation of all Rs 500 and Rs Rs 1,000 banknotes to curb black money.

While announcing the withdrawal of Rs 2000 notes, the RBI had said that they had fulfilled their objective and since banknotes in other denominations were now available in adequate quantities, the printing of Rs 2000 banknotes was stopped in 2018-19.

Most  of the Rs 2,000 notes (89 per cent) were issued before March 2017, and are at the end of their estimated life span of four to five years, the central bank said, highlighting that Rs 2,000 notes are not commonly used for transactions.

“The total value of these banknotes in circulation had declined from Rs  6.73 lakh crore at its peak as on March 31, 2018 (37.3% of Notes in Circulation) to Rs 3.62 lakh crore constituting only 10.8% of Notes in Circulation on March 31, 2023,” according to RBI figures.