Ranchi/Jamshedpur/Dhanbad: Cash crunch may return to haunt automated teller machines across cities with the calendar announcing three consecutive bank holidays, beginning Saturday.
April 28 being the fourth Saturday of the month, the weekend break is by default longer for bank employees. In addition, April 30 (Monday) is a gazette holiday for Buddha Purnima.
Bank officials allayed fears, saying cash refill operations at ATMs would be executed during the weekend if necessary, but the common man who has just about recovered from a recent crunch situation is not buying it.
"Bank holidays are nothing new. The RBI has adequately replenished chests and we do not anticipate any problem at ATMs," said assistant general manager of SBI (Ranchi zone) Sunil Kumar Gupta.
The PSU bank has the largest network of ATMs both in the capital and the state.
According to Gupta, 10-15 per cent downtime (out-of-order) ATMs is normal everywhere. "They are machines and hence, susceptible to snags. But, a few ATMs not operating does not mirror the whole cash scenario. We will fill up our ATMs either on Saturday or Sunday. There should be no problem," he reiterated.
An official of Canara Bank, not willing to be named, echoed Gupta. "Our outsourced agency will take care of ATMs during this time," he said.
The RBI had, in an official release two days ago, informed that its was supplying more cash to the Bihar-Jharkhand region. "Between January 1 and now, Rs 12,191 crore has been routed. The amount is Rs 446 crore than what was supplied during the same period in 2016," said the release.
SBI's regional manager in Dhanbad Bimlendu Vikash stressed that only manual transaction at bank counters would be affected. "There will be no crisis at ATMs while online transactions will be available to customers as well."
But, Rahul Paswan, a grocer in Ranchi, sounded sceptical. "I think there will be problems. Most ATMs rarely function properly on normal days," he said.
President of Dhanbad zilla chamber Rajesh Gupta said private and PSU banks should refill all their ATMs by Friday night to avoid a crisis.
Bikash Kumar Tiwary, a Tata Steel employee in Jamshedpur, plans to withdraw enough cash to last him till the bank holiday is over. "We recently grappled with a huge crisis. We do not wish to face the same again," he said.
East Singhbhum lead district manager Falguni Roy said directives had been issued to all private and public sector banks to ensure that ATM were replenished even during the holidays. "We do not see a problem in ATM transactions. Bank counters will though reopen on May 1," Roy said.
