Demonetisation: India can no longer live with black money, says Arun Jaitley

NEW DELHI: As debate on demonetisation rages on across the nation, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has changed his facebook cover photo which states that India can no longer live with black money.

Integrity and ethical conduct are pre-requisites for the country's development, he states.

"India cannot afford to live with black money any longer. Honesty, integrity and ethical conduct are requirements of India's development," said Jaitley's facebook cover photo.

With opposition ganging up over demonetisation of 500 and 1,000 rupee notes, the government has been maintaining that the move was needed to eliminate black money, counterfeit notes and terror financing.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had on November 8 announced demonetisation of high value currency notes and asked holders of such notes to deposit them in banks by December 30.

Since then, seemingly unending queues of people trying to deposit and exchange their scrapped currency notes are being witnesses in front of banks and post offices.

Initiating the debate on demonetisation in the Rajya Sabha, Congress leader Anand Sharma said the "ill-timed" and "ill-conceived" move had unleashed "economic anarchy" in the country and benefited a few.