A post (here, here, and here) going viral on social media platforms, claims that the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has changed the guidelines for filling out cheques. The post reads: “According to the new guidelines, cheques written in black ink will no longer be accepted from 01 January 2025, and cheques must be written in blue or green ink to be considered valid. The RBI has taken this step to prevent tampering and alteration of cheques.” The post further alleges that this information was sourced from a report published in The Times of India on 14 January 2025.
The archived version of this post can be found here.
Claim: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has revised the guidelines for filling out cheques, prohibiting the use of black ink. Cheques must now be written exclusively in blue or green ink.
Fact: No, the RBI has not issued any such guidelines prohibiting the use of black ink for writing cheques. According to information available on the RBI website, the RBI has not prescribed any specific ink colours for writing cheques. The Government of India’s official fact-checking unit, PIB Fact Check, also clarified that viral post if fake and that the RBI has not issued any such guidelines. Hence the claim made in the post is FALSE.
We conducted a relevant keyword search to verify the viral claim’s veracity. However, we did not find any credible reports indicating that the RBI has prohibited the use of black ink for filling out cheques. If the RBI had indeed issued such guidelines, it would have garnered significant media attention and been widely reported by numerous media outlets.
During our search, we also found no report from The Times of India supporting the viral claim. We then visited The Times of India website and reviewed its 14 January 2025 news edition, as mentioned in the claim. However, no such report was found there either (here).
We then visited the RBI website and reviewed its press releases, circulars, and publications. However, we did not find any information about any such guidelines.
Next, we conducted a keyword search on the RBI website, which led us to a report (archived link) published on 31 October 2022 titled ‘Frequently Asked Questions’ on the Cheque Truncation System. In this report, it is mentioned that: “The RBI has not prescribed specific ink colours to be used for writing cheques.” However, one should not use different coloured inks to fill out a cheque, as this may render the cheque invalid.
Responding to viral posts, on 17 January 2025, the Government of India’s official fact-checking unit, PIB Fact Check, clarified (archived link) on their official X (formerly Twitter) handle that the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has not issued any new rules prohibiting the use of black ink on cheques. It also stated that the RBI has not prescribed specific ink colours for writing cheques.
It is being claimed in social media posts that @RBI has issued new rules prohibiting the use of black ink on cheques.#PIBFactCheck
▶️This claim is #FAKE
▶️Reserve Bank of India has not prescribed specific ink colors to be used for writing cheques
🔗https://t.co/KTZIk0dawz pic.twitter.com/vbL3LbBtFs
— PIB Fact Check (@PIBFactCheck) January 17, 2025
To sum it up, the RBI has not issued any guidelines specifying the ink colours to be used for filling out cheques.
(This story was originally published by Factly, and republished by NDTV as part of the Shakti Collective)
