The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has issued guidelines for the lenders to set up new currency chests, which comprise of a minimum area of 1,500 square feet for a strong room.
“Area of the strong room/ vault of at least 1,500 sq ft. For those situated in hilly/ inaccessible places, the strong room/ vault area of at least 600 sq ft,” said the RBI while denoting the minimum standards for setting up new currency chests.
Moreover, the new chests must include a processing capacity of 6.6 lakh pieces of banknotes per day.
For the branches situated in the hilly/ inaccessible places, there should be a capacity of 2.1 lakh pieces of banknotes per day, said the Central Bank.
Earlier, a committee appointed by the RBI had recommended that the apex bank should encourage other banks to introduce large currency chests equipped with modern facilities and Chest Balance Limit (CBL) of at least Rs 1,000 crore.
The currency chests must hold a CBL of Rs 1,000 crore, subject to ground realities and reasonable restrictions, at the discretion of the Reserve Bank of India, said RBI.
As stated in the RBI’s annual report of 2017-18, the currency management infrastructure comprises of a network consisting of 19 issue offices of the Reserve Bank, 3,975 currency chest and 3,654 small coin depots of commercial, co-operative and regional rural banks spread across the country.
