Nepal Rastra Bank (NRB), the central monetary authority of the country, has formed a high-level team to probe into circulation of over 1,000 unauthorized notes of Rs 1000 denomination, which sneaked into the market by bypassing NRB´s standard note releasing procedures. An official of the central bank informed that the team led by Bhola Man Shrestha, executive director of the NRB, has been asked to furnish its report by August 18. "Though the volume of the unauthorized notes that went into circulation is not very big, the incident itself is very serious and that is why it needs to be dealt accordingly," said a high-ranking NRB official.
According to a preliminary estimate, a total of 1,008 pieces of such notes went to market and 109 have already been recovered. "Initially it was thought that only eight to ten pieces of such notes sneaked into the market and the Indonesian note printing company Perum Peruri tried to recover such notes by rewarding Rs 28,000 apiece from those who had got the notes," said the official. However, the plan was abandoned after knowing that the number of such notes was over 1,000.
The probe team will try to find out how the notes that were received as samples and should have been destroyed immediately after finalizing their designs went into circulation, said the official.
The official said the Indonesian company has also assured the NRB of assistance in investigation. "A delegation from the company was in capital a couple of days ago and it has also initiated its own investigation into the incident," said the official.
According to preliminary investigation, printing of 1000-rupee notes was ordered before the suspension of present governor Bijaya Nath Bhattarai and at least six set of samples were sent by the press for final approval.
However, the whole note printing process was put off after Bhattarai was suspended in June 2007 on corruption charges. In order to avoid a possible scarcity of notes in the absence of governor to sign the notes, the government then authorized the central bank to issue notes carrying signature of then acting governor Krishna Bahadur Manadhar.
In this connection, the central bank issued a public notice in April 2008 informing the public that the bank would issue 1000-rupee notes signed by Manandhar with prefixes ranging from Kha 21, 000001 to Kha 53, 999999. The bank issued another notice in February 2009 informing the public that the prefixes of the notes with Mandhar´s signature was extended to 54 and 55.
However, the latest saga erupted two weeks ago when a number of 1000-rupee notes with prefix of 55 were traced in the market, but with Bhattarai´s signature.
prem@myrepublica.com
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