In keeping with India’s growing economic might and its status as a major investment destination, the hitherto humble rupee is all set to get a distinct identity in the form of a new symbol and joined a select club of countries whose currencies have an unique identity.
The Union Cabinet on Thursday gave its approval to the symbol, which combines the Roman letter ‘R’ with the Devnagri ‘Ra’ and has two parallel lines running at the top. The parallel lines symbolize the equal to sign. The Rupee symbol was a nice blend of modernity and Indian culture.
An IIT postgraduate D Udaya Kumar has designed the symbol selected. Kumar, who is with the Department of Design at IIT Guwahati. Kumar will receive prize money of Rs 2.5 lakh for his efforts. The design is based on the Tricolour with two lines at the top and white space in between. The symbol for the Rupee to represent the Indian flag, which represent Rupiya to appeal to international and Indian audiences.
The symbol will catapult the rupee into the company of four ‘elite’ currencies, which have similarly distinct identities — The US dollar ($), the euro (€), the Japanese yen (¥) or the pound sterling (£). Now the India joined this group—The Indian Rupee.
It would distinguish the rupee from those countries whose currencies are also designated as Rupee or Rupiah, such as Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Indonesia. The symbol would reflect the strength and robustness of the Indian economy.
Till now, the Indian currency was simply denoted by Rs or INR.
Kumar’s symbol was chosen after a public competition was held among resident Indian citizens inviting entries for a symbol, which ‘‘ reflects and captures the Indian ethos and culture’’. Over 3,000 entries were received. A jury headed by the RBI deputy governor, which included experts from reputed art and design institutes, evaluated these. The entries were presented to the jury in such a manner that the identity of the competitors was not revealed to the jury members. The jury selected five final entries and also gave its evaluation of these five entries to the government to take a final decision.
The Cabinet and other members ratify once the chosen Indian Rupee Symbol. Last month the Union Cabinet had sat down to choose a symbol for the Indian Rupee out of 5 short listed candidates. The decision was expected soon, but it has take well over 2 weeks to finally choose the Indian Rupee Symbol.
The Indian Rupee Symbol was supposed to be chosen from one of the 5 short listed candidates in the picture above. However, the cabinet as the Indian Rupee symbol recommended IIT Post Graduate student D Udaya Kumar’s symbol. The new Rupee currency notes will start sporting this symbol, this does not mean that the old Rupee currency notes will be invalid.
Problem with the new Indian Rupee Currency Symbol is that it would be hard to write the symbol down using natural keyboard, as there is no Hindi word and this Indian Rupee. It would take sometime and efforts to get this Rupee currency symbol to become usable on computers, other than using an image, so there is still lot of work remaining for the government to do before you can type the symbol.
Nevertheless, this is a really proud moment for Indians since the Rupee Symbol will be flaunted across the world and not just the text Rs.
RJ
Rj.rahul23@gmail.com
No comments:
Post a Comment