November 8, 2016, is fast beginning to “rival” June 25, 1975, as a Black Day in Indian democracy. Like Banquo’s ghost, the demonetisation exercise (fiasco?) keeps cropping up to cause considerable embarrassment to the government in general, its finance managers in particular.

So while the ATM that dispensed “toy” notes in South Delhi may turn out to be a one-off goof-up, it only reconfirms that the banking sector is riddled with an inefficiency that the government refused to recognise before it undertook its “historic” exercise that has blundered on so many fronts.

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And that serves to bolster the criticism that, for all its laudable objectives, inept implementation has reduced the term demonetisation to the equivalent of a four-letter word. Even if the bewildered young man who was issued the toy notes is compensated by their being replaced by the bank, the incident further shatters the public’s confidence in the system — a slur that could prove difficult to erase given the beating that the common man took in the aftermath of Modi sarkar’s gamble. This is, perhaps, not the appropriate occasion to recall the horror stories

that were told from November 8 onwards, but it would be opportune to remind those in North Block that their sense of comfort at having overcome a crisis is gossamer-thin, and that redeeming the image of banks remains an arduous exercise.

The claim of the State Bank of India that its mechanisms are “robust” and that an investigation is underway have been ripped apart, and the suggestion that some persons delivering cash to ATMs are responsible for the bungle is so typical of sustained sarkari endeavours to pass the buck down to someone too “small” to defend himself.

Has a single bank official been penalised for the hardships, deaths included, to which the common man was subjected? Surely the citizens deserve better: even if their plight seldom impacts those ensconced at the crest of Raisina Hill.

The common folk would be little impressed by the “speed” with which Opposition politicians used the incident at the Sangam Vihar ATM to further split the people on party lines. Just as they have been unimpressed by the BJP leadership’s bid to project any electoral success as certifying demonetisation. And that would hold true regardless of what the EVMs throw up on March 11.

Such over-simplification of what “concerns” the people is insulting, as indeed is the comparing of the number of cemeteries and crematoriums, or the quality of the electricity supply during Ramzan and Diwali.

Viewed against a broader canvas of national (mis)governance that otherwise little-known ATM does tell a powerful story — of how ministers and officials consistently “toy” with the aam janta.