Desperate people queue up on streets

Thousands of people flocked to banks for exchange or deposit of monetised currency notes of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 on Thursday. People started arriving even before the banks opened.

Police were deployed at bank branches in Hyderabad and other towns in Telangana to control the crowd. Director General of Police of Telangana, Anurag Sharma directed all superintendents of police and commissioners to take necessary steps for crowd control.

Though it was announced that the banks will open at 8 am, the transactions started only at 9am. While some banks like ICICI opened the doors for public later than announced, many public sector banks had not opened even at 10am.

Although people stood for long hours in queues, most banks failed to provide any basic facilities like drinking water, sitting arrangement or shade.

At ICICI Bank's branch in Toli Chowki, the transactions started at 9am. The staff helped customers with filling up of forms for exchange of notes and getting Xerox copies of their identification cards.

Chief Manager of Bank of India (Karkhana Branch) Sampath said, “The bank is operating as usual, but there is panic in the public for the exchange of notes and to deposit the amount including the literate people.

The bank did not receive new currency notes so we started exchanging old notes of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 to denomination of Rs 100.”

However, most banks ran out of both Rs 2,000 and Rs 100 notes too soon. Branch Manager of United Bank of India Ashutosh Garodia said, “There are many customers coming for exchange.

We did not receive any new notes yet and we are running short of Rs 100 ones. So, we put up notice of ‘No Exchange’ for convinces of customer.”

Though there was no limit on deposit, for big amounts the banks were insisting on PAN number. Those drawing Rs 10,000 from their bank accounts were also asked to produce their identity proof.

Answering a query Deputy Manager of State Bank of Hyderabad, Chandra Kala said that customers were being cooperative with the staff. “Because of the rush we opened five extra counters,” he said.

Worried about expenses, a customer at State Bank of Hyderabad Syed Paruf lamented, “I came here to exchange my old notes. It took me an hour for me to do that.

Although it’s a good decision taken by the government, but the common people are suffering and not able to buy essential commodities.”