New Coins with Rupee Symbol issued in India by RBI

The medium of exchange is currency and the Indian currency is Rupee.  The Rupee is further subdivided into 100 units called ‘paise’ and other than the paper currency – Rupee notes, coins are also in circulation and are legal tenders.   As all of us know,  we now have a new symbol denoting the Indian Rupee.  It is a mix of the Devanagri ‘Ra’ and Roman ‘R’,  designed by IIT post-graduate D.Uday Kumar which was approved by the Union Cabinet on July 15, 2010.

More than a year after the approval of the new symbol, our currency notes still do not have the depiction of symbol.  Most banks have had them printed in their cheque books though.  It is a good news that Indian Govt has approved and soon coins having the symbol would be in circulation in a big way.  The new Indian Rupee will now join the elite club of US dollar, British pound-sterling, Euro and Japanese Yen to have its own symbol.

The Government of India has the sole right to mint coins. The responsibility for coinage vests with the Government of India in terms of the Coinage Act, 1906 as amended from time to time. The designing and minting of coins in various denominations is also the responsibility of the Government of India. Coins are minted at the four India Government Mints at Mumbai, Alipore(Kolkata), Saifabad(Hyderabad), Cherlapally (Hyderabad) and NOIDA (UP).   There is a statue called Indian Coinage Act 1906, which was legislated to consolidate and amend the law relating to Coinage and the Mint. 

According to Sec 14. (1) of the Act -   The rupee shall be divided into one hundred units and the new coin representing such unit may be designated by the Central Government, by notification in the official Gazette, under such name as it thinks fit, and the rupee, half-rupee and quarter-rupee shall be respectively equivalent to one hundred , fifty and twenty-five such new coins and shall, subject to the provisions of sub-section (1) and sub-section (2) of section 13 and to the extent specified therein, be a legal tender in payment or on account accordingly.

The coins are issued for circulation only through the Reserve Bank in terms of the RBI Act.   Earlier there were coins of Paise 1,2,3,5,10,20,25  - not any longer  as 25 paise is not a legal tender.  Presently in vogue are : 50 paise, one rupee, two rupees and five rupees.  Earlier, Coins upto 50 paise were called 'small coins' and coins of Rupee one and above are called 'Rupee Coins'. Coins can be issued up to the denomination of Rs.1000 as per the Coinage Act, 1906.

Coins are received from the Mints and issued into circulation through its Regional Issue offices/sub-offices of the Reserve Bank and a wide network of currency chests and coin depots maintained by banks and Government treasuries spread across the country.  At some select offices of RBI, coin dispensing machines have been installed.  Infact remember seeing one at Chennai Central suburban station but was dysfunctional ages back or perhaps immediately after it was installed.   The modern day coins are mostly cupro-nickel and are of very less weight. 

Here are the new Ten rupee coin and  Two rupee coin with  " Rupee symbol"

             

Some of the two rupee coins in circulations with the latest one on far right

With regards

S. Sampathkumar.