It has billionaires aplenty and economic growth Britain would kill for. But India believes that it is missing one thing: a symbol for the rupee, which has been in use since the 16th century.
Last year the Finance Ministry challenged the public to come up with a design. The shortlist is thought to include variations on the letter “R” with a pair of parallel lines. Ideally it will depict both India’s modern material progress and complex heritage. A winner is expected to be chosen this week.
The Indian Government may look to Europe’s experience with the euro — the most recent creation of a key currency — for guidance. The European Commission believes that it chose the common currency’s symbol well, noting on its website that the “success of the euro as a currency worldwide owes a small debt to the unique and memorable symbol supporting the euro notes and coins”.
The official record states that the symbol is “a combination of the Greek epsilon, as a sign of the weight of European civilisation, an E for Europe, and the parallel lines crossing through stand for the stability of the euro”.
By contrast, the origins of the world’s most important currency, the US dollar, are lost in obscurity. One theory is that it started out as a slash through the numeral eight, denoting pieces of eight.
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Another is that it represents a staff from which snakes dangle, a symbol for Hermes, the Greek God of bankers and thieves.
The rupee has been in use since the 16th century, when the conquering Afghan emperor Sher Shah Suri coined the term “rupiya”. The word’s roots are thought to stretch back to the ancient Sanskrit “rupyakam”, which means “wrought silver”.
In all that time, however, it has been bereft of a symbol — unlike international heavyweights such as the dollar, yen and sterling. Rather, the sub-continent’s beancounters have written the word out longhand, or substituted it with “Rs”.
Choosing a successful rupee symbol will be tricky, branding experts say. The winner have to be simple enough to be legible on small coins and mobile phone keyboards.
“Ideally it should encapsulate India’s proud past and its massively ambitious future,” said Duncan James, of The Brand Union, a global brand consultancy whose clients include Vodafone and Mars.