The curious case of notes issued by 'Children Bank of India'

Was it a just a prank or sheer disdain towards the so-called security features touted by govt?

Ok! Let’s get the prank part out of the way. The counterfeit note dispensed by a State Bank of India ATM in Delhi may have had Children Bank of India written on it, but don’t confuse it as a child’s or a single grown-up adult’s act.

It isn’t easy to copy a currency note. The paper quality of the counterfeit currency had to be close to the original, if not perfect – close enough to beat the ATM technology which dispensed it. The colour had to be close so that it did not stand out when the entire bunch was being put into the machine by the filler. Before that, it had to be mixed with a bunch of original notes. And the most importantly, the entire operation required a printing press.  

So, by no means, it was a one man’s freak experiment. It was a well-planned event. Was it done by a terrorist nation? I doubt. The words used, Children’s Bank, Churan, PK… makes it seem that it is most likely to be an in-house job which wanted to show its disdain towards the new notes and mock the demonetisation exercise. And the group is organised enough to successfully target the country’s largest bank’s ATM in the country’s capital.

Next question: are there printing presses in India which produce counterfeit notes? And don’t the intelligence agencies know about it?

Of course, the ATM machine could have been tampered with to allow dispensing of counterfeit notes. Then, it is a bigger problem. Less than six months back, accounts of over three million people were compromised. We still don’t know the actual damage it caused.

Whatever the reason, let’s be clear that it can’t be classified as a stray incident. It is one thing to go on harping in press conferences that the new notes are more secure. But when such an incident happens, both the Reserve Bank of India and the government need to swing into action.

Banks, on their part, have to be more responsible. Instead of destroying counterfeit notes, which is done more often than not, they have to ensure that each and every note is accounted for through a proper first-information report.

More importantly, they shouldn’t intimidate the person who is reporting the counterfeit note. This is again something that bank officials are prone to doing because it saves them the trouble of reporting these notes. Scaring the depositor will only enhance the problem.

Last but not the least, remember that this nuisance happened in a city and to a person who could read and spot the hoax. In a small town, someone might just tried to transact with it and got into big trouble or even worse, lost his livelihood for a few days or in the worst case, even jailed for years.

The fact: someone has shown complete disdain towards the Indian currency and our establishment. This is where ‘national pride’ should come in. Otherwise, it’s easy to beat up college students and label everyone who doesn’t agree as ‘anti-national’.

Postscript: On Saturday, ICICI Bank ATMs disbursed Children's Bank Notes in Haryana.