As pay day nears, pressure set to mount on banks

With the cash crunch continuing and pay day nearing, pressure is bound to go up on banks, with hundreds of thousands of customers expected to approach the institutions once the salaries and pensions are credited.

Bankers are not ruling out a repeat of scenes witnessed earlier this month — of long queues, frayed tempers, and disappointed customers. Though cash supply may have improved, the banks could still fall short of currency the customers demand.

A senior official of the State Bank of Hyderabad, however, expected the situation to be better this time, with a substantial sum having been released by the Reserve Bank of India to the State and improved availability of new ₹500 notes. Over the last few days, several automated teller machines also came back to life, though the cash fed into them was not enough to keep them going for long.

Stating that the situation would be no different on Monday, Telangana State Government Retired Employees’ Association secretary general R. Vishwas Reddy pointed out how many pensioners were unable to get ₹10,000 at one go this month despite a Telangana government advisory to the banks.

The State government is yet to come up with a similar notification for the December payments, advising major public sector banks to issue a portion of the salaries/pension as cash. Banks are also yet to take a decision on setting up additional counters and working extended hours to manage the rush.

Customer complaints of not being able to withdraw ₹24,000 that they are permitted to in a week also remain. Thus, over 50 days after the decision to demonetise high value currency notes, rationing of cash by banks continues with a decision on how much to be issued left to the branch managers depending on the supplies.