Black money provides pink employment

For the last two and a half months, every morning there is a long queue outside the Reserve Bank of India’s Belapur office to exchange Rs 2000 notes, which were withdrawn from circulation on September 30, 2023. Over a period of time, this queue should have reduced or even disappeared. But hundreds still come, a few as early as 5 am, and wait for hours before they get the lower denomination currency notes. An investigation by LokmatTimes.Com found that most of these people are doing this for a small fee for those who couldn’t declare cash to the government. Those seeking to exchange notes at RBI offices are required to present their AADHAR number for the records. This provision has been made to prevent black money getting exchanged. But the clever black money mafia seems to have found a loophole even this. 

As a result, families, with their kids in toe, stand in queues with every single one of them having exactly ten currency notes of Rs 2000. Not one of them has less than 10 notes at a time. A little prodding with those standing in queue revealed that each person exchanging Rs 20000 gets Rs 1500. As many as 400 tokens are issued every morning for exchange of the Rs 2000 currency notes. Ideally, there should be just one queue of those who are seeking or have got tokens. But this reporter noticed two and upon inquiring, was told that while one queue was that of people brought in by the agents facilitating currency notes, the other queue was of those who had come to exchange their own notes.  Alert Citizen Forum, a local NGO, claims there is an organised network behind this operation. Sudhir Dani, founder member of the forum, said there was no mechanism in place to verify the authenticity of the individuals in the queue. He urged the review of CCTV footage to identify repeat visitors and assess their occupation and income. 

As per guidelines, individuals can approach the RBI office to exchange up to Rs 20,000 or 10 notes of Rs 2000 by submitting Aadhar details. The same person can only revisit the exchange after a 15-day interval. “How is it that each one of them, even the young kids, has exactly 10 currency notes,” Dani asked. A woman, who didn’t wish to be named for obvious reasons, admitted she was going to get Rs 1500 by the agent for exchanging Rs 20,000. She said she could bring in more people if this reporter wished to exchange more. One of the people standing in the queue even showed a long list of such agents on his cellphone. LokmatTimes.Com reached out to RBI Mumbai via email for a response. However, as of Wednesday evening, no response had been received from the RBI. Surprisingly, on the following day, security personnel were observed dispersing unnecessary crowds gathered at the bank's entrance, resulting in a significantly reduced queue.