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₹2,000 a difficult ‘change’ for city grocery store owners in Ludhiana
Locals are visiting the shops to buy grocery for as little as ₹100 in a bid to exchange their ₹2,000 notes following RBI’s directive to withdraw the high denomination note by September 30
After petrol pumps, locals in the city are flocking grocery stores to exchange their ₹2,000 notes, leaving shopkeepers in a fix to arrange lower denomination notes and customers red-faced.
Locals are visiting the shops to buy grocery for as little as ₹100 in a bid to exchange their ₹2,000 notes following RBI’s directive to withdraw the high denomination note by September 30.
A number of grocery store owners were seen pasting notices saying, “We accept ₹2,000 notes on a minimum shopping of ₹1,500”.
The situation has led to heated arguments between shopkeepers and customers, who argue that as stated by RBI, the note is a legal tender and cannot be refused.
“We are getting only ₹2,000 notes since morning. People buy things as basic as bread and eggs and give ₹2,000 note. We have got 30 such notes till now. It is a difficult task arranging so much change as majority payments are online now,” said Joly of Krishna Provision Store in BRS Nagar.
Similar was the scenario across other shops in the city where customers were seen arguing with shopkeepers over the latter’s non-acceptance of notes.
“It is a legal tender. How can it be not accepted?” said Ashok, a resident of Ghumar Mandi, expressing his dismay and inconvenience.
“People are unnecessarily panicking. There are four months to spend the notes or exchange these,” said Rohit Kumar, another shopkeeper.
Manish Gupta, owner of Gupta Karyana Store located at Bhai wala Chowk, stated, “The two thousand rupees note is a legal tender, and we are accepting it. However, we request that the bill amount should be at least ₹1,000 due to the scarcity of smaller denomination notes. Unfortunately, not all bills meet this criterion, and in such cases, we have to accommodate our customers by offering them change via UPI or BHIM app,” Gupta said, adding that as a consequence, their end-of-day collection predominantly consists of ₹2,000 notes, resulting in more frequent visits to the bank.
