Is the claim about the green strip position on a Rs 500 currency note true? Fact Check!

A Facebook user named Angira Satish Yashmit shared a post on a page named ‘Senior Citizens Family’ on 13 June 2019. The post has a photograph of two 500 Rupees currency. One of the note has Duplicate written on it and the other has OK written on it. The post claims “Please do not accept Rs. 500 currency note on which the green strip is close to Gandhiji because it’s fake. Accept a currency note where the strip is *near Governor’s signature.* Please pass this message to all family and friends…” Let us see what the facts are!  

NARRATIVE ON SOCIAL MEDIA:

FacebookPost | ArchivedLink

FACT CHECK:

We first searched on Google with ‘how to identify fake 500 note’ key words. We got a news by ‘Economic Times’ dated 20 September 2017. In this news, total 176 security features of 500 note is given. The description of the green strip in detail is that when you look at the note straight, the strip is visible green. However, when you tilt the note, this strip appears blue.

In the entire article, nowhere is the specific position of the green strip written.

EconomicTimesPost | ArchivedPost

Apart from this when we searched on Google with ‘कैसे करें 500 नोट की नकली असली पहचान’ key words; we came across a news article by ‘timesnownews.com’ dated 17 January 2019.

In this news too, it is mentioned about the security thread that when you tilt the note slightly, the green colour of the strip will appear blue. In this news also, there is no mention of the fact that this strip is printed at any specific place.

TimesnownewsPost | ArchivedLink

After this, we searched directly on the Reserve Bank of India website. We received a press release issued by the bank on this website. As per this press release, click on this link to see the 17-security feature about 500 Rupees currency. It is written on the 5^th point, when the note is tilted slightly, the green colour strip will change into blue colour. However, there is no mention of the position of the Security strip or any other information.

You can find information about the entire 17 security features in PDF format by clicking on this link.

With these findings, it is clear that the security feature on the 500-currency note is related to changing its colour, and not from its printing place. We checked different 500 notes and found that on every note the security thread position changes. This cannot define the currency as counterfeit. If the security thread were a feature of the fixed place, then RBI’s press release would mention it.

IN CONCLUSION:

Fact Crescendo has fact checked and confirms that the photograph is being share in the post with a wrong narrative. We categorise the story as FALSE.

FactCrescendo advises its readers to refrain from sharing such misleading and communally biased photographs and do a self-check on the true narrative of such incidents before believing them.