Not a single 2000-rupee note has been printed in the financial year 2018-19, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has informed an English daily in reply to a Right To Information (RTI) inquiry.
The development surfaces three years after India's central bank introduced the 2000-rupee note, following the Centre's decision to scrap the high-denomination notes of Rs 500 and Rs 1000.
“Possibly, removing high-value notes from circulation makes it difficult to have too many black money transactions. But, it’s a better policy than demonetisation, which was very disruptive. Here, you are not disrupting anything. You are simply withdrawing circulation,” The New Indian Express quoted economist Nitin Desai as saying.
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Desai added that many European countries had done the same before and since the value of total circulation was being maintained and there won't be much of a problem.
According to RBI's reply, the English daily reported that 3,542.991 million notes of Rs 2,000 were printed during the financial year 2016-17.
In the following year, however, there was a significant reduction in printing with only 111.507 million notes being produced. The number of notes came down further to 46.690 million notes in the year 2018-19.
There were reports earlier this year that RBI had stopped printing the 2000-rupee notes but the government had vehemently denied it.
