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“We’re Bankers, There’s Only So Much We Can Do!”, A Bank Manager Reacts To Demonetisation.

byAbhishek Kulkarni
16th November 2016
4 minute read

PM Modi’s recent demonetisation initiative has been greeted with mixed reactions. Some have lauded the move as being a radical weapon against the growing amount of black money in the Indian economy. While others have condemned it as being a serious inconvenience as they are scrambling around all day trying to get their old (now worthless) notes exchanged.

However, some people have chosen to direct all their rage towards the bank branch cashiers who have been working tirelessly to furnish customers with new notes.

Humans of Bombay recently posted this picture of a woman who is employed as a bank manager. She talks about how hard the past few days have been for all branch employees and opens up about how she faced the wrath of several customers post-demonetisation.

bank-brach-employee
Image Source
“I’m the manager at a bank. On 8th November, I was working a bit late when my husband called me and said, ‘how did you not tell me that 500 and 1000 Rupee notes are getting scraped’ and I was shell shocked. None of us had any idea what was going on…we just knew it was huge. So we went into work the next day, preparing for the days to come but no amount of preparation could fully prepare us for what was coming.
People’s view of the whole situation was limited to the lines they saw outside the bank, but what was happening behind closed doors was entirely different. We became a part of the dirty cycle that runs in this country. On one end there were chaiwallas, istriwallas who are queuing up to deposit their hard earned money but on the other end we’re receiving black money that had been stashed away for years possibly and all this cash smells like rotten leather to the point where every one of our branches has ordered masks for the cashiers — that’s how unbearable the stench became!
From fights breaking out and the police intervening to educated people storming our offices and violently asking us for money — we’ve dealt with it all.
Just the other day a builder who’s had an account with us for many years, came forward to finally pay us an amount that he had defaulted on a Non-Performing Asset. When we had chased him for months to pay up, he had defaulted but all of a sudden he came forward! He has over 300 crores in black money, but before this, he claimed to have none at all — that’s how dirty the business is.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining about what has happened — it’s a revolutionary move that will only strengthen our country and I completely understand what the common man is going through as well, but what can we possibly do? There’s only so much cash we have, and only so many people who can attend to such a large population.
What’s ridiculous is how people are behaving— they’re treating us so badly. Just 4 hours ago I received a call from a man from a place called Nanded who screamed at me non-stop. He went on yelling, blaming me, cursing in Marathi and I’m sitting there just wondering what I could possibly do and we’ve received dozens of such calls each day. Not just that, but the threats have also come. We get calls from people who are politically endowed and threaten to ‘send media to expose us’ or to ‘create a scene’ if we don’t move money — I mean when will we learn? We’re bankers — there’s only so much we can do!
We’ve hardly slept these past few days, we’re not taking any weekends off…in fact, most of us haven’t even exchanged our own 500 Rupee notes because we’re trying to help others first.
Our banks are losing money on interest and there’s already enough chaos…do we really need to add to it? We’re all in the same situation, we just need to sit tight and understand that steps are being taken to aid the process — this is for the future of our country and the least we can all do at a time like this is have patience and believe that everything will stabilise soon. And for heaven’s sake, stop trying to use more corrupt methods to get out of an already corrupt situation…we don’t need any more of it!”

 

The rage of the people is understandable as a lot of the Indian economy runs on cash transactions. It will take some time for citizens to adjust to the post-demonetisation phase in the country. However, it is unreasonable for people to direct this rage at those bank employees who have been tirelessly working towards ensuring that maximum customers are able to get their cash exchanged.

They are trying their best, let’s appreciate them for their efforts rather than criticise them for their failures.  

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