SBP issues clarification after video of half-printed currency notes sparked social media outrage
- State bank issues clarification on misprinted banknotes.
- Says mechanism of segregating misprinted banknotes available.
- “Merely 10 misprinted currency notes among dispatched cash bundles”.
The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) on Wednesday issued a clarification after the online controversy about half-printed banknotes that emerged earlier today, saying that the risk of such faults remains due to large scale printing and production of currency notes.
A social media outrage among Pakistanis was triggered by a video of half-printed banknotes making rounds on the internet. A man, who called himself the bank manager of National Bank of Pakistan’s (NBP) Model Colony branch in Karachi, showed two fresh Rs1000 banknotes, which were blank on the backside.
“I have no idea how many bundles have been dispatched already. These were returned by a customer and that is how we got to know about it,” he said.
He then showed another bundle saying that same was the case with notes in that stack and every bundle had two such half-printed notes.
Responding to the matter, the central bank initially stated that an investigation had been launched into the matter. Later, it issued a clarification, saying: “Pakistan Security Printing Corporation has a strong mechanism of segregating misprinted banknotes. Though, risk of such faults remains in mass production [of currency notes].”
The SBP said that there is always a possibility of a few misprinted notes reaching the masses despite all quality checks.
“There were merely 10 such misprinted currency notes among the cash bundles dispatched to the NBP branch,” it stated, adding that the said number of half-printed banknotes compared to the total number of notes printed and dispatched to the masses was “very little”.
The central bank further clarified that those who have received such defective notes can exchange them for perfect notes from SBP’s BSC counters.
The SBP is making the internal controllers to avoid such malfunctioning in the future, the bank added.
