The announcement of note ban on November 8, 2016, was made before the RBI approved the decision. The announcement was made within less than two and a half hours after the former RBI Governor Urjit Patel-led Central Board, was asked to consider Centre’s demonetisation proposal. Even before the central bank’s board approved of it, Prime Minister Narendra Modi went ahead with the decision.
According to Deccan Herald, the Board sent the approval to the government on December 16, 38 days after the Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency notes were banned; disagreeing with most of the government’s pleas in favour of the ban.
This was revealed by the RBI, for the first time, in the minutes of the meeting of its board held at 5.30 pm on November 8, 2016, sought through an RTI query.
RBI directors were of the view that demonetisation would be ineffective because most of the black money was held in the form of real-sector assets such as gold or real estate and not in cash.