New Delhi: Nearly a year after Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced demonetisation, the Rs500 and Rs1,000 bills returned to banks are still being “processed in all earnest” through a sophisticated currency-verification system, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has said.

In reply to an right to information (RTI) query, the central bank said it has processed about 11.34 billion Rs500 notes and 5.249 billion junked Rs1,000 bills, with a face value of Rs5.67 trillion and Rs5.24 trillion respectively, as of September 30.

The combined value of the processed notes is Rs109.1 billion approximately, according to the reply.

“Specified Bank Notes are being processed in all earnest in double shift on all available machines [sophisticated counting machines],” the RBI said in reply to the RTI query filed by a PTI correspondent.

The central bank was asked to provide details of demonetised notes counted so far.

Replying to a question on providing the deadline for completing the counting exercise, it said, “The verification of notes withdrawn from the circulation is an ongoing process”.

The RBI said at least 66 Sophisticated Currency Verification and Processing (CVPS) machines were being used to count the now defunct notes post demonetisation.

The government had on November 8 last year banned the use of old Rs500 and Rs1,000 notes and allowed the holders of these currency bills to deposit them with banks or use them at certain notified utilities.

The notes deposited or collected are being verified by the central bank at its offices to establish the total number of currency bills returned and to weed out those that are fake.

Several opposition parties including the Congress and Mamata Banerjee’s All India Trinamool Congress have announced that they would observe on November 8, the first anniversary of demonetisation, as ‘Black Day’ and would hold protests across the country to highlight its “ill-effects” on the economy.

To counter the opposition protest, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party has decided to observe the note ban anniversary as “anti- blackmoney day”.

In its annual report for 2016-17 released on August 30, the RBI had said Rs15.28 trillion, or 99 per cent of the demonetised Rs500 and Rs1,000 notes, have returned to the banking system.

In the annual report, which was for the year ended June 30, 2017, the central bank said only Rs160.5 billion out of the Rs15.44 trillion in old high-denomination notes have not returned.

As on November 8, 2016, there were 17.165 billion pieces of Rs500 and 6.858 billion pieces of Rs1,000 notes in circulation, totalling Rs15.44 trillion, it had said.

“Subject to future corrections based on verification process when completed, the estimated value of specified bank notes received as on June 30, 2017, is Rs15.28 trillion,” RBI had said in the report.

While the counterfeit currency notes made for a minuscule number, RBI post-demonetisation spent Rs79.65 billion on printing new Rs500 and Rs2,000 bills and notes of other denominations, more than double the Rs34.21 billion spent in the previous year, it said.