Demonetization of Old High Denomination (OHD) Notes

The demonetization of OHD notes by the government w.e.f 9^th November 2016 was a bold step towards curbing the menace of black money in our country. This move was welcomed by a large section of society even though it created a lot of inconvenience to them.

The decision to withdraw the OHD notes was announced after banking hours by giving a few hours to black money holders to do something. Banks were given time to customize their Core Banking Solution (CBS) and ATM Switch. Everything went perfect till this point. But when the Banks reopened for business after this, there was not enough legal tender currency in the system to meet the requirements of general public. Only new two thousand rupee notes were pumped into the economy adding fuel to the situation. People were struggling to get change for two thousand notes. Five hundred rupee notes are still not available in many branches. If five hundred notes were released along with two thousand, situation would not have been worsened this much.

Adding to the woes of rural population, Reserve Bank has denied the exchange of OHD notes in cooperative banks. Still a major chunk of rural population is dependent on cooperative banks for their banking requirements. At least the provision of exchange of notes would have been given to those cooperative banks where CBS is implemented. Also the unavailability of enough cash in cooperative banks, especially in village cooperative banks is affecting the rural economy. Reserve bank and government should take immediate steps to sort out the cash crunch in cooperative banks to save the rural economy.

In spite of all the hardships, majority of people have welcomed the step to curb the black money circulation. Even though there are some short term disturbances in the economy, this step will be beneficial in a long term. Inflation should come down which will give more comfort to the common man. Also this would give a huge push towards digitizing the economy.

Bank employees across the country, especially in the branches have done an appreciable job in dealing with the situation.

The opinions mentioned above are purely of the author and does not have  political or any other interests.

Happy Independence Day

Are you Living to Work?

Are you living to work or working to live? Definitely I belong to the later group. It has become a trend now to sit late in office. People believe that late working people are hard working also. Sometimes it becomes inevitable to sit late and finish some urgent work. But such types of work will be bare minimum. We should learn to manage and prioritize our work. The need of the hour is not hardworking people but smart working people.

The working condition has become worse in Public Sector Banks, especially in branches of PSBs. Almost all branches are working with less than required staff, quite a few branches does not have required infrastructure, officers travel to nearby branches to complete their day to day work, officers are forced to stretch their working hours sacrificing their family life. After doing all these, they struggle for a decent hike in their salary. We cannot even compare the salary of a Central Govt. Class I employee with a Scale I PSB employee. The difference may be huge. Govt. has constituted the 7^th Pay Commission to revise central govt. employee’s salary which is due in Jan 2016 while we struggle to finalize our revision which was already due in Nov 2012.

A change is inevitable. Each one of us should initiate that change. Reach office on time, do your work sincerely and try to leave office on time so that you get enough time to spend with your family and friends. Ignore the people who sit and kill their time at office. Why we require a six day week while the Banking regulator works only for 5 days? This is the age of technology. Technology has grown to such an extent that it can almost replace human intervention. Five day week should be implemented in banking sector also.

Banking sector is a major contributor in development of any country. But Bankers are not getting that recognition.

Happy Republic Day...

Aam Aadmi Government

It is good to see a change happening in Indian politics. The AAP has given a warning to all major political parties in India that they should not forget the people.  Arvind Kejriwal has started the works for fulfilling AAP’s promises from day one itself. Now the question is how long congress will hold on to their support extended to AAP.