When most of the ATMs remain dry across the State with the char dham pilgrimage having started, regional director, Reserve Bank of India, Uttarakhand region Subrata Das claimed on Wednesday that the cash crunch crisis would be over in a couple of days as sufficient cash has been received from RBI, Kanpur for the State. He further assured that the ATMs located along the char dham yarta routes would be replenished with cash soon. Notably, the people are now facing a severe cash crisis with most of the ATMs remaining out of cash for over a week. Things might aggravate further as the pilgrims have started streaming in with the portal of two of the four shrines having opened on Wednesday. “I am assuring on behalf of RBI that the cash crunch crisis would be over in a day or two,” Das said.
Things on the ground remained grim though in the State as a majority of the ATMs spread over places like Dehradun, Chamoli, Rishikesh, Haldwani, Nainital, Rudrapur and Haridwar was cashless on Wednesday.
In view of the cash crisis dragging on with the dates of the reopening of the shrine Badrinath drawing near, the District Magistrate Chamoli-which houses the shrine- Ashish Kumar Joshi convened an emergency meeting with the bank officials on Wednesday and discussed ways on how to take on the looming cash crisis. He is learnt to have asked the bank officials to take steps to ensure that the ATMs are rightly replenished with cash in no time with the date of opening of the portals of Badrinath approaching near.
Things in Tehri and Almora districts are equally bad, said the senior officers of the districts. There are around 60 ATMs of various banks in Almora district and most of them are now running dry.
Das said that that there are about 800 branches and around 1000 ATMs of various government and private banks located along the char dham yatra routes while 16, 00 branches and 3000 ATMs of various banks are operating across the state. “People should use cash cautiously and refrain from storing it unnecessarily as long as the crisis persists. The cash must be allowed to be circulated. However, I am assuring them that the crisis would be solved soon as we have received sufficient cash from RBI, Kanpur with which the dry ATMs would be replenished,” he added.
The situation was grim in Dehradun too on Wednesday as most of the ATMs remained dry. A few of them which had cash saw serpentine queues of people, a sight which reminded them of the dark post-demonetisation days. Aman Singh, a resident of Raipur, said, “I visited several ATMs which were dry. However, as I desperately needed some cash I took money from a friend as a loan.” Ananya, another resident of Raipur , said that things were really grim. “Aside from the dry ATMs, the banks were cash-starved too. This reminds me of our predicament during the post-demonetisation dark days,” she said. Anil Bhatt, a retired bank officer now residing in Vikasnagar, said, “My plight is miserable. My son is going to Delhi and I am unable to withdraw money from any of the ATMs I flocked to from Raipur to Dharampur.”