Ghaziabad residents run from pillar to post to get cash

Woes of Ghaziabad residents due to the scrapping of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency notes persisted on Friday, as the ATMs of most banks displayed either 'Out of Order' or 'No Cash' boards, resulting in long queues outside bank branches.

In the hope of getting cash from ATMs from November 11, as announced by the government, the residents started forming queues outside ATM outlets since morning, but were disappointed to see that those were not able to deliver cash.

"We are facing double trouble -- while ATMs are not dispensing cash, as promised by the government, the old currency is not being exchanged easily. We have been told that the machines would be operational in the evening since the cash carriers are on the way. But machines were not dispensing cash till 5:00 p.m.," said Ashutosh Srivastava, a businessman.

"I have asked my driver, cook, maid and my mother's nurse to stand in the queue before the HDFC Bank to exchange the old currency notes. But they could not get till 2.00 p.m. I had to prepare my meal since the entire staff was standing in queue. I have never seen such situation in my life," said the young entrepreneur.

Saloni Srivastava, a student, reached an ICICI Bank ATM to get cash at 12.10 a.m. on Thursday-Friday night. But she was disappointed to see that the machine was not dispensing cash.

Saloni told IANS that she thought that the machine would start delivering cash from midnight onwards, so she asked her family driver to take her to the ATM nearby her house. But the machine was empty. Again in the morning, she reached the ATM but the machine was again without cash.

Another resident M.P. Singh, a retired bank officer, told IANS over phone that he is returning from Goa since he has run out of cash.

"The city is facing an unprecedented situation for the first time, so we have deployed police personnel outside each bank branch to control any untoward incident," said SP City Salman Taj Patil.

"We are getting complaints that at some places, people are misbehaving with the bank staff. Our staff members are exhausted dealing with the public," said G.V. Jaishankar Prasad, AGM of Syndicate Bank, Raj Nagar branch.

--IANS

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