The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Friday, May 19, announced that it has decided to withdraw the Rs 2,000 currency notes from circulation. The central bank asked all to deposit the Rs 2,000 banknotes into their accounts or exchange them for banknotes of other denominations at any bank branch by September 30, 2023.
The ₹2000 denomination banknote was introduced in November 2016 under Section 24(1) of RBI Act, 1934 primarily with the objective to meet the currency requirement of the economy in an expeditious manner after withdrawal of the legal tender status of all ₹500 and ₹1000 banknotes in circulation at that time. With fulfilment of that objective and availability of banknotes in other denominations in adequate quantities, printing of ₹2000 banknotes was stopped in 2018-19. A majority of the ₹2000 denomination notes were issued prior to March 2017 and are at the end of their estimated life-span of 4-5 years.
Though it was not demonetisation, in the 58 cases filed by the opposition camp in the Supreme Court on demonetisation in 2016, the Supreme Court ruled that demonetisation was not a wrong decision of the central government. Earlier, the opposition had repeatedly alleged that demonetisation had caused inconvenience to the common man. Yes, the common man may have suffered a bit. But the common man does not understand who they were most affected by demonetisation.
The entire country has witnessed that corrupt, black money traders were in dire straits as a result of this.
According to finance ministry data tabled in the Lok Sabha, the government collected about Rs 6.73 trillion in income tax in 2022 as against Rs 2.58 trillion before demonetisation. Along with income tax, the government has also collected more taxes than before in terms of corporate tax. During this period corporate tax rose to over Rs 7.12 trillion from Rs 4.28 trillion.
However, it is not that black marketeers have become very aware after demonetisation. The trend of paying taxes may have increased but black marketing has not completely stopped. That’s why even today we see crores of rupees being recovered from the bottom of the bed. They are not able to show any source of income. So it is clearly understood who will be in trouble if the Rs 2,000 notes are discontinued.
But, if we analyze deeply, we will see that India’s demonetisation in 2016 is a major reason for Pakistan’s economic woes today. It may be surprising to hear why Pakistan is suffering due to India’s demonetisation! But this is the truth. Pakistan’s annual income from Indian fake currency was more than Rs 500 crore. While the Reserve Bank of India used to spend Rs 29 to make Rs 1,000 notes in India, Pakistan used to make fake Indian currency notes at a cost of Rs 39 by paying only Rs 10 more and spread it to different parts of India through various smuggling channels.
They used to sell Rs 350 to Rs 400 notes made at a cost of Rs 39. According to sources, Pakistan’s inter-services intelligence agency ISI and major terror outfits like Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed are behind it. Even in the last few years, the money earned from fake currency has been used in the major incidents of terrorism that have taken place in India.
After the demonetisation decision in 2016, their annual income of crores of rupees from these fake notes has stopped. We are now seeing the results of this. Another thing we noticed strangely was that after demonetisation in 2016, stone pelting on soldiers in Kashmir has stopped by. This is because the money supply of terror outfits, most of which came from fake currency, had stopped.
Therefore, demonetisation played a major role not only in curbing corruption within the country but also in detecting all these corruptions at the international level. And now, with the decision of the Reserve Bank of India to stop the rs 2,000 notes, the fake notes that were currently being made again will be stopped in one stroke. The RBI’s decision to root out corruption and terrorism is a firm step in the interest of the people and in the interest of the country.
