Cash Crunch: Ailing woman dies outside bank in Bihar, says report

As reports have come in from parts of the country, particularly Gujarat and Bihar, of people facing cash crunch for the second time after demonetisation in November 2016, news has come from Bihar that an old and ailing woman, who had been making rounds of a bank for cash withdrawal, has died without health care for want of money. The news was reported by LiveBihar on Friday.

ATMs have reportedly been running dry in several states. The government and Reserve Bank of India (RBI) have announced that currency note production would be increased. While ATMs and banks have been faced with cash crunch in Rupauli block of Purnia district, a bank denied adequate money to a woman, due to which she could not get timely medical treatment that resulted in her death outside the bank, according to the report.

A resident of Maini Santhal village, Noorjahan Khatoon had been paying visits to the Central Bank of India, Rupauli for the past four days. On Thursday, she was waiting outside the bank for one-and-a-half hours when she breathed her last.

Bibi Roshan, daughter-in-law of the deceased woman told LiveBihar that Noorjahan was not keeping well for the past several days. She said that Noorjahan was regularly visiting the bank to withdraw money but bank officials would tell her that the bank is running out of cash. The woman was again brought to bank in an auto rickshaw on Thursday at around 10.30 am, where she died waiting for her own money, according to Bibi. After withdrawing money, we had to take her to Purnia for her medical check-up, she added.

“Lal Mohammad, son of Noorjahan who had gone inside bank had asked for withdrawl of ₹17,000. But cashier Krishan Murari Sinha offered just ₹5,000 which Lal refused to accept. Meanwhile, his mother’s heath deteriorated and she died in the auto rickshaw,” the report said. It quoted deputy branch manager of the bank, Sudhanshu Shekhar as saying, “since the beginning of the new financial year, there is dearth of currency notes. The bank branch is running its daily operations on the basis of transactions with local depositors.”

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