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Journalism of Courage
On Wednesday, a Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court said it was aware of the “Lakshman Rekha” in commenting on matters of government policy, but added that it would examine the manner in which the 2016 demonetisation exercise was carried out, before deciding if the issue was only academic now, six years having passed. The matter will be heard on November 9.
The petitioners argued that the government had failed to meet its stated objectives from the exercise. A rundown:
November 8, 2016
Announcing that Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes would cease to be legal tenders from midnight of that day, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said: “This is a chance for every citizen to take part in the fight against black money and corruption.”
November 13, 2016
With widespread problems in getting old money exchanged, and getting cash, PM Modi told a gathering in Goa: “I had asked for 50 days for demonetisation work. Dear countrymen, please give me these 50 days… If you face any difficulty after that, if you find me dishonest in my effort, you can punish me in whatever way you wish … Mind you, this is not the end of the road, this is not the full stop. I have got many projects lined up to curb corruption and dishonesty in the country. These measures are inevitable if the condition of honest and poor people of the country is to be improved.”
November 23, 2016
Then Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi told the Supreme Court that the government expected to ‘neutralise” “Rs 4-5 lakh crore… used in the Northeast and J&K to fuel trouble in India”. By this point, only 35% of the scrapped money had come back.
November 25, 2016
Speaking at the foundation laying ceremony of the All-India Institute for Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in Bathinda, Modi raised cashless transactions as a benefit of demonetisation. “Your mobile phone can be turned into your bank and wallet. Today’s tech can help you use it for purchasing things, making payments.”
November 27, 2016
The PM took the conversation further in his first Mann Ki Baat programme after demonetisation on November 27 that year. “The great task that the country wants to accomplish today is the realisation of our dream of a ‘Cashless Society’,” he said.
December 31, 2016
On New Year’s Eve of 2017, it had been 50 days since the decision was taken. By this point, the conversation took a sharp political turn.
“There is no precedent globally to what India has done…The excess of cash was fuelling inflation and black-marketing. It was denying the poor their due,” the PM said in a televised address. He went on to invoke “Jayaprakash Narayan, Lal Bahadur Shastri, Ram Manohar Lohia, and Kamaraj” to applaud citizens for braving inconveniences during the demonetisation.
The conversation then got framed into a battle between “honest and dishonest” and “rich vs poor”. Modi said: “There are only 24 lakh people in India who accept that their annual income is more than Rs 10 lakh. Can we digest this? Look at the big bungalows and big cars around you”.
February 8, 2017
The narrative continued. In a Rajya Sabha debate on February 8, the PM said: “We will have to be tough on those who are cheating the system. When we do that, the hands of the poor will be strengthened… There is a horizontal divide – on one side are the people of India and the Government, and on the other side are a group of political leaders.”
August 2018
BJP MPs in the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance stalled the adoption of a draft report by the panel on demonetisation, which was critical of the Modi government’s note-ban decision. “Demonetisation was a decision of great ramifications, which led to at least one percentage point GDP loss and unemployment in informal sectors due to cash crunch,” the committee headed by Congress leader M Veerappa Moily said.
Almost all the BJP members, a majority in the 31-member panel, supported a dissent note to Moily written by party MP Nishikant Dubey. “Demonetisation was the mother of all reforms,” Dubey said in the note.
November 2018
In an interview to India Today, BJP minister Shiv Pratap Shukla said: “The PM never said demonetisation was about black money.”
November 8, 2020
Marking four years of the demonetisation decision, the PM took to Twitter to say that the move had “helped reduce black money, increase tax compliance and formalization, and given a boost to transparency”.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman claimed “Rs 900 crore of undisclosed income was seized in the first four months after demonetisation”. She added that by 2020, “assets worth Rs 3,950 crores were seized” and that “surveys conducted post-demonetisation led to unearthing of undisclosed income worth several crore… Operation Clean Money helped formalise the economy”.
The Opposition Congress alleged that the main aim of demonetisation was to waive the loans of big defaulters and claimed that the move resulted in the GDP growth rate decreasing by 2.2% and employment falling by 3%.
November 2021
As the demonetisation decision completed five years, Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi asked: “If demonetisation was successful, then why hasn’t corruption ended? Why didn’t the black money come back? Why hasn’t the economy gone cashless? Why didn’t terrorism hurt? Why is inflation not controlled?”
As of October 8, 2021, currency with the public stood at Rs 28.30 lakh crore – up 57.48 per cent, or Rs 10.33 lakh crore, from a level of Rs 17.97 lakh crore on November 4, 2016.
