Demonetisation: Then and now

The 1978 demonetisation was stalled for some time by bitter opposition from the then finance secretary and the secretary, economic affairs. Finally, then finance minister H M Patel decided to request prime minister Morarji Desai to reconsider. The secretary, economic affairs, ducked the meeting, pleading that the finance minister would be discussing political matters. 

Desai, in his typical schoolmaster fashion, gave Patel a long lecture. The finance minister felt that had the bureaucrats been present, the PM might have been gentler with his Cabinet colleagues. No evidence the bureaucracy opposed — let alone vigorously — this round of demonetisation. Or that the finance minister took a second opinion. Last time, it took six months for the dust to settle.