‘Opposition spreading fear’: Amit Malviya after RBI scraps ₹2,000 notes

BJP's Amit Malviya slammed the opposition on Friday for criticising RBI's decision to withdraw ₹2,000 currency notes.

BJP's IT cell head Amit Malviya on Friday hit out at the opposition after it flayed the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) move to scrap the highest value currency notes from circulation. Terming the opposition’s attacks as desperate and to stoke fear among the public, Malviya said the same strategy had been employed to spread rumours about the Covid-19 vaccine during the pandemic.

BJP's IT-cell head Amit Malviya. (File)

“What does a desperate and issueless Opposition do when the RBI takes a decision to withdraw 2,000 rupee note, of which there (withdrawing and introducing currency notes) are several precedence in the past? Answer: Fear monger. They did so even during the times of Covid. So much so that they went to the extent of promoting vaccine hesitancy, without once realising that it may be detrimental to the health of people at large and weaken India’s fight against the once in a century pandemic,” he tweeted.

Stating the reasons behind the RBI’s decision, the BJP leader also shared details about the exchange facility available to citizens.

Read: ‘Second surgical strike on black money’: Sushil Modi on ₹2,000 note withdrawal

The Congress slammed Prime Minister Narendra Modi saying the RBI announcement was ‘typical of our self-styled vishwaguru’.

“First Act, Second Think (FAST). 2000 rupee notes introduced with such fanfare after that singularly disastrous 'Tughlaqi firman' of Nov 8 2016 are now being withdrawn," Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh tweeted.

Senior Congress leader and former Union minister P Chidambaram took a swipe at the ruling BJP saying the demonetisation “has come full circle!” The ₹2,000 note was introduced in 2016 after the Narendra Modi-led government abruptly withdrew ₹500 and ₹1000 denominations in an effort to curb black money

Congress spokesperson Pawan Khera said the "ghost" of November 8, 2016, has come back to haunt the nation once again whileCPI MP Binoy Viswam called for a ‘white paper on the country's economy’ to show the effects of demonetisation.

The RBI said the decision has been taken as the 2,000 rupee note isn’t commonly used for transactions and “the stock of banknotes in other denominations is adequate to meet the currency requirement.” People can deposit ₹2,000 rupee notes into their bank accounts in batches of maximum ₹20,000 rupees each or exchange them for lower denominations until September 30.

The move echoes Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s demonetization decision in 2016, which removed almost all cash with the public. However, the latest decision impacts just about 11% of currency in circulation and therefore will probably trigger little chaos, according to a Bloomberg report.

(With inputs from PTI, Bloomberg)