The British Impact on Native Indian Coinages
By Stan Goron | Tuesday, 8 October 1996
It was the Portuguese who first issued coins in India during the reign of D. Joao III (1521-57). These bore a coat of arms, St Thomas, armillary sphere and cross, etc. The first British settlement in India was at Surat in 1612. A factory had been opened at Masulipatam in 1611 and the first factories in Bengal were opened in 1633. Bombay island was ceded to the British Crown by the Portuguese in 1661 upon the marriage of Catherine of Braganza to Charles II. It was delivered to the representatives of the British Crown in 1665. Coinage in circulation in the Bombay area at the time was mainly Portuguese, though no doubt some Mughal coinage was also used.
The first East India Company (EIC) coinage was struck in the Madras Presidency and consisted of gold pagodas (1643-7 ?) of native type. The first EIC Bombay coinage was struck in 1672 and consisted of silver Anglinas (rupees) and copperoons or pice: these bore the arms of the Company and Latin inscriptions. The Anglinas would have enjoyed little, if any, acceptance beyond the Company's sphere of influence so coins were struck in Mughal style but hearing the name of the English monarch. Coins of this type were first struck in 1687 in the name of James H. Better known now are the rupees in the name of William and Mary of 1693-4. Their legends read: 'Coin struck during the reign of King William and Queen Mary in their 6th regnal year. Coin of the English rulers. Struck at Bombay'. However, these coins incurred the displeasure of the Mughal emperor, Aurangzeb, and the coining was discontinued.
It was not until the reign of Farrukhsiyar (1713-19) that silver coinage in Bombay resumed, in Mughal style and with the permission of the Mughal emperor. The copper coinage continued to bear a crown and Latin text.
A number of the native-style coins betray British influence. The rupee of Shajehanabad (Delhi) in the name of the Mughal emperor Shah 'Alam II, year AH 1218 (=1803) depicted an English lion. This presumably reflects the capture of the city at that time by General Lake. Another rupee of year AH 1219 (1804) has a floral border, also doubtless under British influence. A copper paisa in the name of Muhammad Akbar II has the initials WH = John William Hessing, the Dutch commander of the fort of Agra under the Marathas (Mahadji Sindhia) for a few years before the British took the town in 1804. A Bareily rupee in the name of Shah 'Alam II, year 37, has the Persian letter wa. These coins were struck with the same regal date from AH 1216 to 1220 (1801-5). Bareily at this time was in the possession of the British and it is thought that the wa represents the initial of the new settlement officer, Henry Wellesley.
There are coins with portraits of the British monarchs such as the Bharatpur rupee. Gold and silver coins of this type were struck at both Bharatpur and Dig between 1858 and 1862 during the reign of Jaswant Singh (1852-93). He was a minor when he began his reign and the British political agent acted at regent. Jaswant Singh is mentioned on the reverse of the coins. Bindraban struck rupees and halves between 1858 and 1867 that were crude copies of the Bharatpur coinage. This area passed to the East India Company in 1803-5.
Because of the multiplicity of state coinages of very varying quality and the fact that some states melted down the British Indian coinage to make their own debased coinage for their own profit, the Government was keen to suppress the native mints or at least enter into a suitable arrangement with the rulers. On 30 September 1872 a resolution was passed, prescribing the conditions upon which the Government was prepared to promote legislation admitting the coins of Native States to be legal tender in British India. The resolution was forwarded to the Foreign Department, with the intimation that after the assent of the Secretary of State for India was obtained, the necessary legislation would be undertaken as soon as information was received that any Native State was ready to enter into the reciprocal arrangement described in the Resolution. Alwar was the first state to accept the invitation during a period when the Political Agent was acting as President of Regency for the young Maharao Raja Mangal Singh. This acceptance resulted in the passing of an Act in 1876 entitled: 'An Act to enable the Government of India to declare certain coins of Native States to be a legal tender in British India. It provided for coins struck in gold, silver and copper and included the following conditions:
- coins to be struck in any mint in British India
- fineness and weight had to be identical with that prescribed for the Government of India issues
- obverse and reverse designs had to differ from coins made or issued in the Native States
- value had to be inscribed in the English language
- the Native State had to suppress its mint or mints for a period of not less than 30 years
Few states followed Alwar's example.
After 1857, when the Government of India took over the East India Company, the name of the British monarch featured on many of the states' coinage, often with the name of the local ruler. Bundi coins have the name of the British monarch in English and the local ruler's name in Nagali on the other side. For example, rupees of Jaipur in the name of Queen Victoria are dated 1858 and 1864 and were struck during the reign of Ram Singh, whose name appears on the other side of the coins. They read: Zarb Sawai Jaipur sanah...ba-andi malikah rnu'azzamah Sultanat Inglistan Victoria = Struck at Saiw Jaipur in the year... by permission of Her Majesty Victoria, Queen of England. A rupee of the state of Alwar under Sheeodan Singh (1857-74), of the Rajgarh mint, 1859, reads: Malikah rnu'azzatnah takiu nashin dar-us-sultanat Inglistan sikkah mubarak Iswy... = Auspicious coin of Her Majesty the Queen, England the seat of Empire, in the year of Jesus...
A Nazarana rupee of Jaisalmir, a state in the far west of Rajasthan, is based on the rupees of the Mughal emperor Muhammad Shah, struck in Shahjehanabad (Delhi), year 22. All the coins bear this regnal year and the script on the coins is very crude. Rupees were struck at many mints and also half rupees at some (such as Jodhpur) in the name of Edward VII and George V. Very few full rupees were struck in this state after the reign of Victoria but, interestingly, Jodhpur is one of the few states that struck coins in the name of Edward VIII, in copper. The rupees of Kuchawan, which was feudatory to Jodhpur, struck under Thakur Kesri Singh were 75% silver and 25% alloy. They were much used by bankers, and by the Rajputs, in paying largesse to temples, or by others at marriage ceremonies.
An interesting reverse reads: Struck at Kuchawan, in the State of Jodhpur, in the year of Jesus 1863. The state of Radhanpur is interesting as some of the coins are unusual in actually stating the denomination, i.e. rupee, 8 annas, 4 anna, 2 annas. Some also have 50 falus and 100 falus on them! Radhanpur state lay west of Baroda. It comprised 1150 square miles and, in 1881 had a population of 98,129, of whom 50,903 were males and 47,226 females, dwelling in two towns and 156 villages of 23,048 houses. Hindus numbered 80,558, Muslims 11,575, and others 5,784. The chief, Bismila Khan, was 40 years old in 1882 and entitled to an 11-gun salute. He had an estimated gross revenue of £60,000 and maintained a military force of 248 horse and 362 foot. In 1883 there were nine schools with 572 pupils.
The town of Radhanpur itself had a population of 14,722 in 1881, breaking down into 6767 Hindus, 4622 Muslims and 3313 Jains. It lay in the middle of an open plain that was mostly under water during the rains. Its surrounding loop-holed wall was 15 feet high, eight feet broad and about two and a half miles in circumference with corner towers, eight bastioned gateways, outworks and a filled-in ditch. The Nawab lived in an inner fort. The town was a considerable trade centre for Gujarat, Kutch and Bhaunagar. It had a post office, a dispensary and the nearest railway station was 40 miles away. A municipality had recently been organised with an annual income of £70. Exports were rape-seed, wheat, gain and cotton; imports were rice, sugar, tobacco, cloth and ivory.
An interesting character was Raghuraj Singh (1843-80) of Rewa. He assisted the British in 1857 and was awarded the insignia of Knight Commander of the Most Exalted Order of the Star of India in 18644. He went to Calcutta in 1875 to pay his respects to the Prince of Wales and attended the Delhi Durbar in 1877 on the occasion of the assumption of Queen Victoria of the title of Empress of India. He got his salute of 17 guns raised to 19, and died aged 46 in 1880. Another unconventional ruler was Shivaji Rao (1886-1903) of Indore. According to his great grandson, he was a keen wrestler who loved to call people off the streets to wrestle with him and in 1903 he beat up the British Resident. The British Resident at that time was Sir Francis Younghusband (of Lhasa fame), who got his own back by deposing Shivaji Rao.
Some coins show coats of arms but such devices did not feature on Indo-Muslim coinage nor on the majority of state coinage, with the exception of Awadh from 1819. The British devised coats of arms for the 102 Treaty States in time for the 1877 Durbar at which Queen Victoria was proclaimed Empress of India, and some of these came to be depicted on state coins, especially with the advent of more machine-struck coins.
At the 1877 Durbar a number of banners showed the new arms prepared for the states. These were devised by an expert in British heraldry and were adorned with supporters of cows, elephants, scrolls (often with English mottoes) and crests that had helms but no crowns. Typical rupees of Awadh carried arms after 1819 when, at the urging of the British, the then nawab Ghazi-ud-din Haidar accepted the title of King of Awadh.
Curiously, after the middle of the 18th century coins of Tripura were not struck for monetary reasons but merely for ceremonial use at coronations and other ceremonies, and to maintain the right of coinage.
Between 1862 and 1870 the succession to the throne was disputed, but finally decided in favour of Vira Chandra Manikya (1862 -96). The British installed a political agent in 1871, presumably to keep an eye on troublesome tribes who were making incursions into the state. No doubt the British also had a hand in the succession decision and devised the coat of arms on the coins at the same time.
Rupees of Jammu and Kashmir and those issued by Ranbir Singh (1857-85 bear the letters JHS, these having first ben struck in 1850 during the reign of Gulab Singh. There are two explanations known for the appearance of these letters on these and subsequent coins. One says that Lord Lawrence, when at the court of Gulab Singh, was asked by the Maharajah to what the success and prosperity of England was due Lord Lawrence replied that it was due to its being a Christian nation, whereupon he was asked for some symbol of sign of Christianity and he wrote the letters JHS = Jesus Hominum Salvator. Another explanation originating with General G.G. Pearse has it that Anund Messiah, a stormy petrel of a Christian, said that he had induced Gulab Singh to put the letters JHS on the coins in the midst of the Persian script because he had assured the king that by doing so he would not only please the British Indian Government but would also bring god fortune on himself. Both these accounts may well be true. There is also a tradition amongst some people in the Kashmir region that Jesus survived crucifixion and ended up in Kashmir - an illustrated article on this subject by Carlo Buldrini appeared in the India Magazine of January 1983.
