Representational image. Reuters
Currencies are symbolic of a nation’s sovereignty, and often reflect the leaders who have played a crucial role in their nation’s history. For instance, the founding father of Pakistan, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, is featured on its currency, and China features Mao Zedong on its notes. So it is no surprise that some years after independence, India decided to honour the ‘Father of the Nation’ Mahatma Gandhi by featuring his face on the country’s currency. As the nation commemorates Mahatma Gandhi’s 153rd birth anniversary on 2 October, it’s worth remembering that no other leader has had this much of an impact on India’s freedom struggle:
This Gandhi Jayanti, take a look at how Mahatma Gandhi’s portrait came to be on the Indian currency:
In 1969, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) came out with a commemorative note of Rs 100 which showed Mahatma Gandhi seated in the backdrop of Sevagram Ashram. But Bapu’s portrait made its regular appearance on the currency notes in October 1987 when a series of Rs 500 currency notes showing a smiling Gandhi was launched. Since then, Gandhi’s portrait has been regularly featured on notes of different denominations. The RBI put additional features on the currency notes and a new “Mahatma Gandhi Series” was released in 1996. The notes had a changed watermark, latent image, windowed security thread, and intaglio features for visually handicapped individuals.
During a lecture in 2014, former RBI governor Raghuram Rajan was asked why personalities like Homi Bhabha or Rabindranath Tagore were not featured on the rupee notes. To this, Rajan replied that while there are surely many great Indian personalities but Gandhi towers above everyone. He added that there are many great Indians that can be featured on the notes but almost anybody else would be controversial.
In 2014, then Finance Minister Arun Jaitley told Lok Sabha that an RBI panel has rejected the suggestions of replacing Gandhi’s portrait with any other leader on the bank notes. He said, “The Committee decided that no other personality could better represent the ethos of India than Mahatma Gandhi.”
Who was featured on the Indian notes earlier?
King George VI used to be featured on the bank notes of colonial India. Post-1947, it was very important to replace his portrait with a symbol denoting a newly independent India. As per the RBI Museum, the first notes were going to feature Mahatma Gandhi but the final decision went in favour of featuring Lion Capital at Sarnath – the national emblem of India.
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (or Mahatma Gandhi) was born on 2 October, 1869 in Porbandar city of Gujarat. He believed in fighting British oppression with non-violence. He played a crucial role in the Indian independence movement.
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