New rupee currency symbol a sign of growing Indian influence

The arcane subject of currency symbols became a hot topic Thursday when India announced that it will implement a unique symbol for the Indian Rupee in world financial markets. The Indian rupee had no currency symbol before, simply the abbreviations Rs, Re, or INR. The symbol, a composite of the Roman letter R and its Hindi equivalent accented with two slashes, will be finalized June 24 by India’s Union Cabinet. Implementing the new rupee symbol, depending on recent history with the new Euro symbol, may take a few years and cost billions of dollars.

New currency symbol underlines legitimacy of rupee

World financial markets had no way to identify the currency of India, which is the second largest democracy within the world. The Deccan Chronicle reports the new rupee symbol is the winner of a design competition to create a currency symbol representing the historical and cultural ethos of India. Indian official said that the use of abbreviated Rs as currency symbols by neighbors like Sri Lanka, Nepal and Pakistan cause confusion in world financial markets and also the new rupee symbol will end that confusion. The rupee will even be more tradeable in the west with a distinct identity as India strives to become one of the world’s financial leaders.

Elite status sought by Indian government

Unique currency symbols presently exist only for the U.S. dollar, European euro, British pound and Japanese yen. The introduction of the new rupee symbol, the BBC reports, is a statement by India that it is one of the world’s elite economies. As much as 36,000 entries in the rupee symbol contest were judged by a panel of artists, officials and bankers. A teacher of design at the Indian Institute of Technology submitted the winner. The contest awarded him Rs 2.5 lakh in winnings, or about $ 5,350.

Numerous billions spent to implement euro symbol

A new currency symbol is an costly and time-consuming undertaking. Suite 101 reports that it is very difficult to design because it involves rigorous testing across a wide range of technical applications like the web, banners, and mobile phones. In addition, the government has to design and print new money and existing computer keyboards become obsolete. The BBC article pointed out that to update computer systems to deal with the new euro symbol cost them upwards of $ 50 billion.

Citations

deccanchronicle.com

bbc.co.uk

suite101.com