Old Rs.500 Notes acceptable till today: Finance Ministry

People can use old 500 rupee notes for paying utility bills or buying medicines till midnight tonight. In a tweet, Economic Affairs Secretary Shaktikanta Das said, exemptions for use of old 500 rupee notes will end on the midnight of 15th December. He clarified that sections of media are wrongly reporting the date of deadline.

From tomorrow, old 500 rupee notes will not be acceptable at medicine shops and for paying public utility services such as payment of electricity and water bill etc. Mobile recharge facility with old 500 notes will also not be available. However, people can deposit invalid 500 rupee currency in their bank accounts.

The



government had already withdrawn some of the relaxations like booking railway or plane tickets and payment at petrol pump and toll plaza by using the old 500 notes.While cancelling legal tender of 500 and 1,000 notes on the 8th of last month, the government had allowed them to be used for utility bill payments for the first 72 hours. This deadline was extended repeatedly and the last extension was granted till today.

In between, the government withdrew use of 1,000 rupee notes for utility bill payments and discontinued use of even 500 ones for services like purchase of petrol and diesel at petrol pumps as well as buying air tickets at airport counters.