Gods seek RBI answer for prayers on junked notes

Hyderabad: With the old notes in the denomination of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 being stockpiled in various temples in the State and the Reserve Bank of India yet to respond to their requests for exchanging them with new ones, the Endowments Department officials are now contemplating requesting the State Finance Minister to take the up the matter with the Centre.

After the demonetisation, hundreds of temples in the State received lakhs of rupees in the form of old notes through hundi. Official sources said the famous Sri Lakshmi Narasimha Swamy Temple in Yadagirigutta alone had old notes worth about Rs 6.5 lakh. The officials got to know about this money only after opening the Hundi.

The officials were puzzled when they had noticed the old notes as the last date for the exchange of old notes ended on March 31 and for the non-resident Indians it would be ending on June 30.

Sources said the officials had no idea as what to do with the old notes as the banks had refused to accept them. Sources said on coming to know about the old currencies, the Vigilance Department inquired from the temples about the demonetised notes and asked them to show past records. On verifying the records, the Vigilance wing was satisfied that there was no irregularity in these temples.

Executive Officer of the Sri Lakshmi Narasimha Swamy Vari Devasthanam N Geetha told Hans India that the temple had Rs 6.5 lakh in the form of demonetised notes of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 denominations. She said they had written to their respective banks for accepting the money and there was no response from the banks.

The Executive Officer of Sri Seetha Ramachandra Swamy Vari Devasthanam K Prabhakar Srinivas said they too had old currency. He said the hundi of the temple would be opened on June 28 and it would be clear as to what extent the old currency was put in hundi in the temple. He said he had joined as the EO recently and his predecessor had written to the bank authorities informing them about the old currency notes and had no information on the reply.

However, the official sources said in a similar case, the RBI had told the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam that it cannot take the old currency as rules do not permit them. Hence, the officials of devasthanams are going to approach the Endowments Minister A Indrakaran Reddy and urge him to take up the issue with the State Finance Minister E Rajender so that he could in turn plead with the Centre to find a solution to the issue.

By K Chandrashekar