IBRAHIMPUR: Under pressure of demonetisation, India is adapting willy-nilly to what the Prime Minister Narendra Modi called a less cash economy. Fed up of standing in queues at banks and ATMs, people are making a shift towards cashless transactions, mainly in urban areas. But how would a village cope?
To gain some insights into the coping process, The Sunday Standard visited Ibrahimpur, a village in Telangana, Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao’s native district of Siddipet, which has been touted as some kind of a model village for the brave new world.
It’s a village of a little over 270 households, about 80 km from Hyderabad, the state capital. After a few weeks of difficulties, the youths of the village, the district administration and the local bankers got together and decided to do something about it. A few Point of Sale (PoS) machines and a bit of political will helped. Something of a cashless economy has indeed been achieved in this island of rural India. In Ibrahimpur, one can go to a store or hotel without a rupee in one’s pocket. “Be it our groceries or even a bottle of toddy, we no longer need to look for small change,” one villager said, flashing his RuPay card.
K Ramaswamy, who runs a kirana store in the village, said 50 per cent of his business now is cashless. “I used to do business of `3,000 daily. After November 8, my business dwindled drastically. I got a PoS machine four days back and now my business has improved,’’ he said.