There was no respite for the common man on Friday as banks and ATMs across Telangana and Andhra Pradesh continue to be flooded by people to exchange / withdraw / deposit money in the new denominations after the old ones were demonetised by the Modi-led government.
People expecting some relief with the scheduled reopening of ATMs were in for a disappointment as almost all ATMs remained closed with the "no cash" sign board hunged outside most of them. Some ATMs opened at a few places in Hyderabad but ran out of cash within no time. Officials of various banks said that it would take a few more days for ATMs to resume normal functioning. They attributed the delay to technical changes that were made for dispensing new notes.
The banks are also yet to receive new Rs. 500 and Rs. 2,000 currency notes to load into the ATMs. The agencies which operate the machines said that demonetized notes of Rs. 500 and Rs. 1,000 were yet to be removed from 40% of the ATMs.
There was utter chaos at all branches of banks in the city, especially in public banks, for the second consecutive day on Friday. Serpentine queues were seen everywhere. People lined up since morning to either exchange the demonetized notes with new ones or deposit them. With the people parking their vehicles around the banks, it led to traffic problems at some places. The Bank authorities and police had a tough time controlling the crowds. Business was affected due to demonetization. With severe crunch of change, small traders shut down their businesses. There was thin traffic in usually busy areas, reflecting the impact of demonetization on business and trade.