New Delhi, Sept 8: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has amended the norms pertaining to the exchange of old, dilapidated, mutilated or defective currency notes at its designated offices and centres. The new rules will come into immediate effect, the central bank said in a press release on Friday.

The change was necessitated due to the demonetisation drive of November 2016 which replaced the old larger currencies of Rs 500 and Rs 1000, with new notes of Rs 200, Rs 500 and Rs 2,000. Since the new currency notes were smaller in tangible size as compared to their predecessors, an amendment in the norms were necessitated.

The statement issued by the RBI said it has made relevant changes to the Reserve Bank of India (Note Refund) Rules, 2009, thereby allowing the people to exchange the "new Mahatma Gandhi series" notes, if they are defective or mutilated, without facing hurdles.

"We further inform that there is a change in the minimum area of the single largest undivided piece of the note required for payment of full value for notes of rupees fifty and above denominations," the statement added.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Sep 08, 2018 03:31 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).