Demonetisation Timeline: Citizen pulse during last 50 days and way forward
New Delhi, 30 December, 2016: With around 1.2 million citizens connected, LocalCircles was the most active social media platform to track how the citizen pulse was evolving during these 50 days post demonetisation. More than 100,000 citizens participated in debates and discussions on demonetisation with around 350,000 poll responses, posts, and comments came in on various aspects of it.
In the last 2 months, citizens via LocalCircles have been sharing real time experience and pulse on demonetisation. Also few submissions were made to the Government and many were shared via broader media and some of the collective citizen inputs led to introduction of new rules and modification of the existing ones. This report provides the timeline of key citizen inputs and how they evolved over time. The key areas were:
- 1. Support for the cause
- 2. Support for the implementation and who was responsible for the gaps
- 3. Citizen experiences with ATMs
- 4. Citizen experiences with bank withdrawals
- 5. How Citizen spending and earning was impacted what was felt by traders
- 6: How were startups and SMEs impacted
- 7. New Currency availability
- 8. Hoarding experience
- 9. Laundering experience
- 10. Way Forward per Citizenry
Below are the details:
Pre-Demonetisation: What people felt (Poll between Oct 31-Nov 8)
78% citizens were in support of the cause of demonetisation before it was announced
Support for Cause of Demonetisation
Support for the “Cause of Demonetisation” was very high at 97% and was maintained though the demonetisation period.
Implementation Rating of Demonetisation
Citizens rating of the implementation of demonetisation gradually went down from 51% in second week to 30% in last week of demonetisation
Responsibility for Demonetisation Planning and Implementation Gaps
People were split on who should be held responsible for the gaps in planning and implementation of Demonetisation. People are holding RBI, Banks, Ministry of Finance and the Prime Minister almost responsible in equal proportion with RBI just slightly more than others.
Availability of cash dispensing ATMs remained poor and till date has only shown limited improvement
Majority were unable to withdraw the Government permitted withdrawal amount from their bank account
Impact on Businesses Earnings and Consumer Spending
50% citizens were spending less while for 20% citizens earnings were impacted. 30% of the lower spending was due to cash crunch and 20% of the lower spending was there due to uncertainty.
Impact on Traders
90% of the traders had a negative impact on business with business declines of 30-90% for 44% of the traders
Impact on Startups and SMEs
86% startups and SMEs said demonetisation was a positive for them in the long run as majority use technology to transact.
28% startups and SMEs said demonetisation had negatively impacted their account receivables
34% startups and SMEs said demonetisation had negatively impacted customer transaction flow
31% startups and SMEs said they expect demonetisation to negatively impact funding and expansion plans
Availability of new 500 rupee note
68% people said they still hadn’t received the new 500 rupee note in late December
Hoarding of the high denomination 2000 rupee note
59% people are still resisting using the 2000 rupee note
Laundering became common place per citizens
84% citizens said people have been able to convert their black money into white easily.
Way Forward for the Government per Citizens
77% citizens said it is critical for the Government to scrutinize laundered money for the success of the demonetisation and catch people who have been able to convert their black money into white easily.
73% citizens support reasonable withdrawal restrictions to scrutinize laundering
About LocalCircles
LocalCircles, India’s leading Community Social Media platform takes Social Media to the next level and makes it about Communities, Governance and Utility. It enables citizens to connect with communities for most aspects of urban daily life like Neighborhood, Constituency, City, Government, Causes, Interests and Needs, seek information/assistance when needed, come together for various initiatives and improve their urban daily life. LocalCircles is free for citizens and always will be!
Akshay Gupta - media@localcircles.com, +91-8585909866
