MUMBAI, June 7 (Reuters) - About three-fourths of Indians are choosing to deposit the recently withdrawn 2000-rupee notes into bank accounts so far rather than exchanging them for smaller denominations, with the trend likely to boost bank deposits, bankers said.
In May, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said it would withdraw these high-value notes from circulation and permitted their exchange or deposit until Sept. 30.
When announced, the value of these notes in circulation was 3.6 trillion rupees ($43.61 billion), the RBI said.
Though the total quantum of notes deposited or exchanged so far is not available, six public and private sector bankers Reuters spoke to said over 80% of the notes received by them have been deposited into accounts.
The initial assumption is the overall bank deposit base would increase by at least 1.5 trillion rupees, with SBI contributing 22%-25%, the SBI official said.
Persons:
Virat Diwanji, Gaura Sen Gupta, Dipanwita Mazumdar, Siddhi Nayak, Swati Bhat, Sonia Cheema
Organizations:
Reserve Bank of India, Reuters, State Bank of India, Bank of Baroda, Union Bank of India, Bank of India, Kotak Mahindra Bank, IDFC FIRST Bank, SBI, Siddhi, Thomson
Locations:
MUMBAI, BOB.NS, India