Bhubaneswar, Nov. 28: Two consecutive bank holidays on Saturday and Sunday left people running from ATM to ATM in search of cash.
Most ATMs could not be filled up because of the two-day break.
The partial impact of Akrosh Divas protests today added to the woes of people. A senior official of a nationalised bank said: "We had loaded all our ATMs on Friday, but with heavy withdrawals being made, cash was exhausted on Saturday morning triggering the shortage."
With Monday morning came protests against demonetisation led by opposition parties because of which ATMs could not be filled this morning either.
The situation was the same at almost all nationalised and private bank ATMs in the city. While some had downed shutters, those, which were open, dispensed only Rs 2,000 notes. Reserve Bank of India sources said many ATMs had not yet been recalibrated to dispense the new Rs 500 notes, which the people are looking for.
"Most of the people were looking for smaller denomination currency which is easy to use, but the ATMs that were open only dispensed Rs 2,000 notes," said Binod Das, a city-based businessman.
Salaried persons and students were worst hit by the cash crunch in the city. "I had around Rs 1,200 in my account. I couldn't draw the money as most of the ATMs here either didn't have cash or dispensed only Rs 2,000 notes," said Suramya Mishra, an engineering student.
Similar problems were faced by Bibhudatta Panda, a corporate employee, whose bank balance was running low. "I am disappointed. I had drawn Rs 500 from my account on Friday, which brought my balance down to Rs 1,800. I could not draw any money today," said Panda.
He said that he had been running from pillar to post to withdraw the rest of the money since Saturday night, but has not been successful so far. "My balance often goes down during the month end, which is common with an average salaried person. There are three more days for the salary to come in, but I can't withdraw money from the balance left in my account," he added.
RBI general manager S.P. Mohanty told The Telegraph that the central bank was in the process of sending the new currency notes to all the chests across the state and assured that the cash crunch would be over shortly. "The banks have enough money right now to meet the demands of people. The ATMs might have gone dry because of the bank holidays, but the situation will be fine from tomorrow," said Mohanty.
There are more than 200 cash dispensing machines of all banks in the city. However, while more than half of them have been without cash for the past two days, others have been dispensing only Rs 2,000 currency notes. A bank official said that earlier they used to fill the ATMs twice a day, but now they are doing it nearly five times a day, but it is still not enough to meet the demands of the people.
"Since the supply of the new Rs 500 notes is still not enough to meet the demand, we are filling the ATMs with Rs 100 and Rs 2,000 currency notes. People might have withdrawn the lower denomination notes in large quantities leaving only higher denomination notes in the ATMs, which caused inconvenience. The situation will become to normal from tomorrow," assured the official.
