Demonetisation: Cash rush in Panchkula, Mohali

Sharing her plight, Ranjana Devi, 45, who works as a domestic help, said she had to visit five ATMs to withdraw money to purchase medicine for her son. “Yesterday I asked my employer to give my salary, which they couldn’t as they didn’t have enough cash in hand,” said Ranjana. People with bank balances below Rs 2,000 are not able to withdraw money, as most of the tellers are dispensing only Rs 2,000 notes.

Jasraj Singh, 21, a student, made six unsuccessful attempts to withdraw Rs 1,500 from his account. “I need money to buy a book, which I couldn’t,” said Jasraj Singh. According to bank officials, the situation is expected to continue for the next few days.

The Panchkula Deputy Commissioner also marked an inquiry against a bank official after a resident complained that the official refused to accept Rs 10 currency notes.

MOHALI

The ATMs ran dry on Friday, and people again had to go home empty handed as the banks could not provide sufficient cash. Most of the ATMs in the city were either closed or did not have any cash and the people, mostly employees whose salary was transferred to their accounts on December 1, were hassled again.

The Lead District Manager, R K Saini, while speaking to Chandigarh Newsline said that they are providing the cash in the banks and Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is issuing notes on a daily basis to all the banks. He said, however, that the availability of cash in the ATMs is still very low.

“Most of the ATM machines have a capacity of around Rs. 18 lakh, but the availability is only 2 to 3 lakh in these machines, and there is still a rush and the money is not in circulation yet, so the problem persists,” said Saini.

He further said that they got around Rs 50 crore for all the banks and distributed it as per the clientele ratio of the banks. In a day or two, they will get more cash.

Meanwhile, large queues were again witnessed outside the banks where the cash was available in Phase 3B2, Phase 5, Phase 7 and Phase 10. Most of the ATMs were closed.