97.82% of the ₹2000 notes in circulation till 19 May 2023 have returned to the banks. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has given this information today (3 June). According to RBI, only ₹7,755 crore worth of notes were left with the people till 31 May 2024. At the time of announcement of withdrawal of these notes, notes worth ₹3.56 lakh crore were in circulation in the country. RBI had announced to take out ₹2000 notes from circulation on 19 May this year. RBI had said that these notes will still remain legal tender. 2000 notes came into circulation after demonetization in 2016. The last date to exchange or deposit notes in banks was 7 October 2023. Now notes can be exchanged or deposited only in 19 issue offices of RBI. The 19 RBI offices that accept/exchange bank notes are located in Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Belapur, Bhopal, Bhubaneshwar, Chandigarh, Chennai, Guwahati, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Jammu, Kanpur, Kolkata, Lucknow, Mumbai, Nagpur, New Delhi, Patna and Thiruvananthapuram. Any number of notes can be credited to the bank account. 2000 rupee notes worth up to 20 thousand rupees can be exchanged at one time. On the other hand, if you want to get them credited to your bank account, then any number of ₹ 2000 notes can be deposited through the issue office. Printing of 2000 rupee notes stopped from 2018-19 The 2000 rupee note came into the market in November 2016. Then Prime Minister Narendra Modi had announced the ban on 500 and 1000 rupee notes. In their place, 500 and 2000 rupee notes were issued in a new pattern. However, RBI has stopped printing 2000 rupee notes from the year 2018-19. Whereas in 2021-22, 2000 rupee notes worth 38 crores were destroyed. Why did RBI decide to withdraw the notes? The Reserve Bank has taken this decision under the ‘Clean Note Policy’. In the ‘Clean Note Policy’, people have been requested not to write anything on currency notes, because doing so spoils their appearance and also reduces their life. Clean Note Policy has been implemented to achieve the goal that people get good quality bank notes (paper currency) in transactions.
