It costs ₹3.09 to print a new ₹500 note, and ₹3.54 for the ₹2,000 note, according to Bharatiya Reserve Bank Note Mudran Pvt Ltd (BRBNMPL).
Responding to a November 25 query filed by BusinessLine under the Right to Information Act, the Bengaluru-based company said: “The selling price of the new design bank notes printed by BRBNMPL for 2016-17 is ₹3,090 per thousand pieces for ₹500 and ₹3,540 per thousand pieces for ₹2,000.”
The BRBNMPL is a subsidiary of the RBI and prints currency notes on its behalf at two presses, in Mysore and Salboni, West Bengal. These are then bought by the central bank and circulated in the market. The present capacity of both the presses is 16 billion notes a year on a two-shift basis, according to its website.
It, however, did not share details on the number of such notes printed by the RBI as it “falls under the ambit of Section 8(1) (a) of the RTI Act” and is exempt. As a result, the cumulative cost of printing the new notes was not available. Earlier, in response to the same RTI, the RBI had said it does not know the cost of printing the new notes and that its other printing press, the Security Printing and Minting Corporation of India, which is printing the new ₹500 notes, had not worked out the cost.
According to the RBI’s latest weekly statistical supplement, ₹9.26 lakh crore of currency was in circulation as of January 20 as against ₹17.74 lakh crore on November 4.