-The Hindu Business Line 'RBI working on cutting transactions costs on digital payments' New Delhi: RBI Governor Urjit Patel, who appeared before the Public Accounts Committee looking into demonetisation and its impact on monetary policy, told the panel that the country’s infrastructure is not ready for a cashless economy. He assured the panel that the RBI is working out ways to reduce transaction costs involved in digital payments. As was the case when he...

-The Hindu The truth may ultimately prevail about demonetisation, but the government might be able to maintain the loyalty of a large part of the public for a long time, says Amartya Sen More than two months after the demonetisation, Nobel Laureate and economist Amartya Sen says that any proper “economic reasoning could not have sensibly led to such a ham-handed policy.” He predicts that the demonetisation will hit the economy quite...

-The Hindu The ‘batta’ system of rolling financing has shrunk as money cannot be withdrawn from banks, and bearer cheques pile up Varanasi: For the already distressed weavers and poorly paid labourers in the famous Banarasi sari industry, demonetisation has come as a crippling blow. Withdrawal limits of Rs. 50,000 on current accounts (around a 10th of the actual requirement in the trade) and falling business post November 8 have constrained traders from...

-The Times of India BENGALURU/ NEW DELHI: Through Sunday, the media was buzzing with reports that petrol pumps would refuse to accept card payments for fuel from Monday. Anxious consumers, already grappling with a cash shortage, fretted that this would directly clash with the government's efforts to wean people off cash and encourage digital payments. Finally, there was some relief on Sunday night after banks agreed to defer their decision to charge...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: A nationwide network of farmers today dubbed the demonetisation exercise "the most hurtful scheme since independence" and claimed that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's pledges for the agriculture sector announced on December 31 were "a rehash of what already exists". The network of farmers' associations and representatives from across the country said in a letter sent to the Prime Minister that the demonetisation move had shown a "dismaying disregard"...