KARACHI, Oct 6: The State Bank of Pakistan printed fresh currency notes worth Rs69 billion during Ramazan for general public. The figure was, however, less than the previous last year, said the SBP on Monday.

Despite huge printing, there was a general complaint about shortage of fresh currency notes while the black market was full of new notes.

The SBP said it printed notes in much higher number than last year as notes of small denominations were printed in a large number.

The SBP printed 529 million notes worth Rs69 billion while during the same pried last year, 491 million notes worth Rs74 billion were printed.

The SBP had supplied bulk quantity of fresh notes to all banks while it sold such notes from its offices across the country.

Generally people face shortage and have to pay two to three per cent additional amount to the black market for fresh currency notes.