Money for nothing

A half-printed thousand-rupee bill compels a man to spend a day, plodding around at the RBI office, but to no avail

A half-printed thousand-rupee bill compels a man to spend a day, plodding around at the RBI office, but to no avail

A thousand-rupee note that's not worth the paper, it's printed on.

Karkardooma-based Mahesh Kumar was confronted by this perplexing problem on February 22. Kumar, 35, who runs a paint shop, received a wad of thousand-rupee notes from a customer on February 18. Among them was this partially printed bill, which he overlooked at the time.

The problem came to his notice when he sent an employee to deposit some money at the local branch of Khatri Co-operative Bank and the cashier picked out this particular bill. The bank assured Kumar that the note was genuine and it was just a printing error. They suggested that he visit the RBI office in Delhi in order to exchange it.

So, off he went to the RBI office in Connaught Place on February 22. But Kumar says that despite spending most of the day dropping in at every cabin at the central bank, he was left disappointed. "I was shocked when the cashier of Khatri Co-operative Bank told me that my note was not printed properly. I went to the Reserve Bank of India and spent my whole day but didn't get any positive signs from there. I have decided to keep that note with me always," Mahesh told MiD DAY.

According to an RBI spokesperson, "It's a mechanical process and at times we come across such cases. We do help the people whose problems are genuine".