After nearly 99% demonetised notes were back in the system, the government on Wednesday sought to silence its critics, saying people with inadequate nderstanding of how to tackle black money linked the note ban with money returned to the system.
The objective of demonetisation was not confiscation of money, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley told the media after the Reserve Bank of India released the number of demonetisaed notes returned to the banking system.
“The main aim of demonetisation was to squeeze the use of cash, increase digitisation, expand tax base, deal a blow to terror funding and formalise the informal economy, and I am sure we have achieved the objective to the extent possible,” he said.
“It is unfortunate that those who never fought against black money tried to confuse people about the object of demonetisation,” Jaitley said referring to former finance minister P Chidamabram, who mocked the RBI for recommending demonetisation.