On November 8th, 2016 at 8.15 PM when United states was getting ready to elect its new president, India was also making history by transforming our society from cash only society to less-cash society. Even though the underlying cause of demonetization is noble and we desperately needed such move and could have only been expected from PM Modi, the implementation could have been better.
Let me say at the outset that I totally support this move by PM Modi and I hope government will take more such steps in future to make sure the menace of black money and corruption is routed out from our society. There have been numerous articles written by liberals, economists and intellectuals on both sides to explain pros and cons of demonetization, one thing everyone agrees including Nitish Kumar is, its poor implementation.
While we know, the left liberals are used to opposing any good decision this government takes, the questions raised by opposition and others are not entirely wrong. Even though the country is supporting this bold move, the problems they are facing can’t be ignored in the name of only cry by black money hoarders. There are genuine people out there who are raising valid questions and by the way don’t have any black money but their voice is not heard due to the misplaced noise created by opposition. I am a common man and have few questions to be asked of this government;
- Why the RBI dint stop circulation of 500 and 1000 rupees notes couple of months before announcing demonetization? They could have just stopped issuing new notes without announcing it.
- Why couldn’t new 2000 and 500 rupees notes released in the market couple of months earlier?
- Why all the ATM machines couldn’t be re-calibrated and made functional before announcing this move?
- How stopping circulation of old notes and launching new notes would have spooked the black money hoarders?
I have been reading articles available online and looking for answers for above questions but not able to find any satisfactory answer. It has been more than 2 weeks since demonetization is announced and queues at ATMs are still very long. Half of the ATMs are closed since 8th of November. There are plenty of ATMs around but less than half are operational leading to long queues.
I am also unable to understand when people are ready to wait outside an ATM for more than an hour just to withdraw 2500/- rupees, why can’t they spend the same amount of time in bank and withdraw 24000/- rupees which will be enough to cover their monthly expanses. Is it an issue with awareness, probably banks should answer?
The country supports our PM as they have full faith in him but people’s trust shouldn’t be tested like this. The only reason current government is able to get away with such poor implementation is absence of credible opposition. PM Modi should thank his luck this time and make sure such inconvenience is not repeated again in future. We need him to lead this country for 8 more years and he should be aware that such adventures can heavily misfire. People will forget the inconvenience in due course of time but if the results of demonetization are not visible then government will have a reason to worry.
