Patna, Nov. 26: ATMs in the city bore the brunt as the city geared up for two days without banks (which remain closed on Saturday and Sunday).

Cash-strapped people started making a beeline outside ATMs from early morning. While some succeeded in getting cash, others had to return empty-handed or knock on the door of other ATMs.

Even over 19 days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced scrapping of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 denomination currency notes, around half the ATMs in the state are yet to become functional. There are around 6,700 ATMs of around three-dozen different banks in the state. Of these, around 4,000 ATMs were dispensing cash today. Others were either out of cash or having some technical glitches. "Of around eight ATMs at Patel Nagar, only two are functioning," said Saurav Chandra, a resident in the area. All the rest are sporting a board saying "No Cash" or "ATM out of order".

Because of the condition of ATMs in Patel Nagar, Saurav had to visit an ATM on Boring Road to draw cash.

Around 11.30am on Saturday, State Bank of India ATMs in Patna and Ara district faced technical problems because of a server failure. "The problem continued for two hours, with many ATMs unable to dispense cash," said a senior SBI official on condition of anonymity. The problem was sorted out around 1pm.

Bank sources said ATMs would be in great demand on Saturday and Sunday, meeting people's demand for cash with banks being shut. The problem will be greater at smaller banks, as they have a logistics problem transporting cash.

But SBI sources allayed fears. "There is no shortage of cash, as cash was filled at many ATMs. On Sunday, too, cash will be filled," SBI additional general manager (ATM operations) Anand Vikram said. Rs 500 and Rs 2000 new currency notes were fed into ATMs in urban areas of Patna district, he said. The ATMs have the capacity to cater to over 600 people. The ATMs in rural areas were fed with Rs 100 denomination notes that can cater to around 400 people. Of 324 SBI ATMS in Patna district, Vikram said around 270 were functional at peak hour.

Despite the tall claims, many ATMs were not functioning or had long queues. In this backdrop, many people were depending on retail stores like Big Bazaar, that allow its customers to withdraw cash by swiping their debit cards

Manohar Prasad, who was spotted at Big Bazaar's Exhibition Road outlet, said: "As many ATMs are closed or not dispensing cash, I thought of withdrawing cash from Big Bazaar." Patna has three Big Bazaar outlets - on Exhibition Road, at P&M mall and in Raja Bazaar area. "Many people are coming to withdraw cash," said Ravi Shankar, an employee at a Big Bazaar outlet here. "Around 170 people withdrew cash (maximum permissible limit being Rs 2,000) on Friday. Around 40 people have withdrawn cash till 3pm today."

Apart from retail outlets, many people also withdrew cash from petrol pumps. The Centre has announced that petrol pumps would be allowed to dispense Rs 2,000 in cash to anyone with a debit card. Only 2,500 fuel outlets in the country have SBI point-of-sale machines, of which in Bihar the figure is around 200. But these machines, too, were facing cash shortage.

Prabhat Kumar Sinha, president of Bihar Petroleum Dealers' Association said: "As banks are closed on Sunday, there might be difficulties dispensing cash from petrol pumps." According to Sinha, the biggest problem in dispensing cash from petrol pumps is transportation, as many petrol pumps have to carry cash from banks and Sunday being holiday this can't be done.

Sinha also said that till there is problem of change or lower denomination currency notes, banks should provide lower denomination notes like Rs 100, Rs 50, 20 and Rs 10. "Banks are dispending Rs 2,000 notes, which we dread to draw, as we need smaller change to return to customers in transactions."

Petroleum dealers association sources said the problem is in rural areas as there are fewer banks and ATMs there.