In defence of Rs 2,000: Slowdown in printing illogical, consumer-unfriendly

The short point is that the economy not only needs more notes, but an expanding economy with a reasonable degree of inflation needs more notes of larger denomination

The accelerated withdrawal of the Rs 2,000 note over the second half of 2017 and first quarter of 2018 has been widely cited as the key reason for the cash crunch in select states. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has mostly faced criticism for being unable to manage the compensatory supply of a larger number of notes of a smaller denomination to make good the slowdown in printing this higher value note. But the central bank and the government may want to consider whether the drastic reduction in the printing of the Rs 2,000 note is a wise decision