RBI Deputy Governor, Shirish Chandra Murmu in a keynote address had recently stated, “over the past few years, we have produced between 28 and 30 billion banknotes annually across six denominations, and disposed of roughly 21 billion pieces a year. As of today, 176 billion banknotes are in circulation in India. By comparison, roughly 56 billion US dollar bills and 30 billion euro banknotes were in circulation at the end of last year. One caveat, in fairness to the comparison: our count is driven partly by a denomination mix weighted toward lower-value notes, which naturally means more pieces change hands for the same value of transactions. Even so, the volume gives you a sense of the scale of the logistics we manage every day.”
