The State Bank of India (SBI) has said that the newly introduced notes can be counterfeited and the consumers and banks should brace themselves for more fake note discoveries. The report published by SBI has a divergent opinion with the RBI claims which said that the newly introduced notes of Rs 100, 500 and 2,000 have some additional security features and cannot be counterfeited.
In a report released after the RBI published its annual report, the in-house SBI economist said, "The promise of RBI that new currency notes of Rs 200 and Rs 500 (post demonetisation) are more secure and less prone to counterfeit is not entirely correct."
The report said that there was a "noticeable increase" in the fake currencies detected in the denomination of the new Rs 500 and Rs 2,000 notes which are up by 4,178 per cent and by 2,710 per cent respectively.
It also added that going by the same trend, "it is expected that the number of counterfeit notes in the denomination of Rs 500 (new) and Rs 2,000 may increase further and RBI/banks/public should pay more attention to that".
Interestingly, the annual report of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said almost all the Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 denomination notes which were demonetised on November 8, 2016, has returned to the banking system. The opposition parties raised some serious question to the government after on the objective of this prompt step.
Moreover, the reported also said that out of Rs 15.41 lakh crore worth Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes which were in circulation before 8th November 2018, 99.3 per cent or Rs. 15.31 lakh crore came back into the banking system of the country. Only Rs. 10,720 crore of the demonetised currency did not return to the banking system as against the government claim of the about Rs. 3 lakh crore.
The SBI report also said that post demonetisation and the introduction of new notes, there was a sharp drop in the fake currencies by 31.4 per cent to 5.23 lakh pieces in the financial year 2017-18.
