By Prasanta Ku. Dash
Cuttack, Nov 19: Are you in the historic Bali Yatra ground in Odisha’s Cuttack City? Are you keen to purchasing home needs, other household items or home decors from the national-level open fair showcased at the Bali Yatra ground in bulk? You need not be worried to carry hefty amounts in the ocean of crowd, including hard cash heading risk, and for congested e-payments through UPI or credit cards.
It’s because, here is RBI’s ‘Instant Money Bank’ which ensures some essential and immediate banking services & financial transaction at hand. The integrated banking system set up amid the Bali Yatra ground comprising a good number of national and private bankers, is an innovative hub to credit your wealth adding exchange of soiled notes, exchange of higher denomination notes with simpler ones or even with coins, which according to the laymen, are useless and invalid. Here, like formal Tellers in the banks, one can avail several facilities and services of banking and public-friendly financing with the miniature Bank, installed in almost a 30x20 feet stall in the historic Bali Yatra ground in Odisha.
Here, there are decorative counters to exchange soiled notes, coins with notes or notes with coins- or vice versa, as required by the local traders for easy transactions. A trader, who is a part of the open-market fair can on-spot debit or credit hefty amounts of his current capitals here with two banks every day, one with a Nationalized Bank and one Private Sector Bank, to cater to the immediate need of the make-shift traders.
Unlike with the formal Banks, the RBI’s stall which plays more as a replica of Integrated Banking hub has incorporated a Money Plant Model. That’s a well-lit-decorated green tree tagged with notes of varied denominations. The attracting Money Plant Model, according to the RBI officials and Banker present over here, is a replica of financial growth, economic development essential for an individual, institution or for a nation at large. It also promotes the idea of good saving for common citizens, for a brighter future and prosperous living with economic freedom, added the RBI officials.
The public awareness stall in the Bali Yatra-2024 highlighting community banking, was inaugurated by Regional Director, RBI Bhubaneswar Sarada Prasanna Mohanty on November 15. Since then, the RBI’s emphatic presence in this year Bali Yatra has been a crowd puller for the visitors, local denizens and the passersby- who make a merry-go-round across the ground.
Representatives of the RBI accompanied by SBI, HDFC and many more Banks interact with common public face-to-face, erasing out their doubts regarding fake and counterfeit notes. They explain people regarding safe & secured banking through the plethora of visual aids, audio-visual capsules and play-way methods including the Snake & Ladder, available in the kitty awareness stall, to provide a crystal-clear idea to differentiate a counterfeit note from a genuine one.
Apart from it, here is a dedicated counter for soiled note exchange that works in line with the ‘Clear Note’ policy of the RBI. A pair of banks exchanges almost Rs 30 lakh cash here on a daily basis through the temporary teller installed here only to sensitize people on the ease exchange policy.
Similarly, a special unit is working here on erasing the taboo regarding the prevalence and validity of coins. A team throughout the day works on it, educating people that the coins are yet in the market, nobody can say no to it, to barter something in lieu of it. Thousands of people, who witnessed exchange of coins here in the RBI-founded teller with notes on demands of the Bali Yatra traders, were also inspired to use the coins in their daily lives.
