MUMBAI: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has begun printing Rs200 notes with a view to help ease consumer transactions.

The notes of Rs200 denomination are being printed in one of the government-owned facilities after the RBI placed an order a few weeks ago for the bills, according to a report published in The Economic Times.

However, the RBI is yet to officially announce the release of Rs200 note.

"For day-to-day transaction purposes, the introduction of 200 rupee notes will add to the ease of operations," the report quoted Soumya Kanti Ghosh, group chief economist at the SBI Group as saying.

The introduction of the Rs200 currency notes predates the federal government’s decision to overnight withdraw bills of higher denomination in November 2016 as part of a broader exercise to stop counterfeiting and curbing untaxed cash in Asia’s third-biggest economy.

The RBI board had earlier cleared the proposal to issue banknotes of Rs200 denomination. The government, too, had examined the introduction of the new notes that would help citizens transact easily.

Before the November 8 de-monetisation, there were roughly 1,650 crore pieces of Rs500 notes in circulation, according to data from the State Bank of India research. With the removal of this series from the system, there was a large gap in the value of notes in circulation.

As people across the country are facing difficulty due to the scarcity of cash in banks and ATMs, the release of Rs200 note will ease the situation to a large extent. The introduction of 200 rupee notes will replenish the missing middle, triggered by the withdrawal of the old series of 500 rupee notes.

Lower denomination notes aids the government’s efforts at realigning the currency mix in the system.

As on June 9 this year, the currency circulation with the public is at Rs14.6 lakh crore, still 18.4% lower than the pre-demonetisation level.

"The new 200 notes will carry advanced security features. The authorities are taking extra precaution to prevent counterfeiting," said a source aware of the printing schedule.

Currently, those notes are going through different levels of security and quality checks at the government's press unit at Hoshangabad (Madhya Pradesh), the person said.

The printing of currency notes is done either in printing units run by the government-run Security Printing and Minting Corporation of India Ltd or at printing presses in Mysore (Karnataka) and Salboni (West Bengal), managed by the RBI-owned Bharatiya Reserve Bank Note Mudran Private Ltd.