Saturday, July 17, 2010

Increasing status of India shown in new currency symbol for rupee

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. Until now, there has been no currency symbol for the Indian rupee, just the abbreviation Rs, Re, or INR. On June 24, the symbol, a hybrid of the Roman letter R and its Hindi equivalent accentuated with a double slash, could be finalized by India’s Union Cabinet. Implementing the new rupee symbol may take a few years and is bound to cost billions of dollars, depending on the recent implementation of the Euro symbol. Resource for this article – India seeks elite status with new currency symbol for the rupee by Personal Money Store.

New currency symbol marks the rise of the Rupee

The currency of India, the world’s second largest democracy, had no consistent means of identification in world financial markets. 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. Confusion in world financial markets by neighboring countries that use abbreviated Rs for their currency symbol will end with the new rupee symbol, Indian officials said. The rupee may also be more tradeable in the west with a distinct identity as India strives to become one of the world’s financial leaders.

Will elite club of currencies welcome the rupee?

Until now unique currency symbols existing only for the U.S. dollar, European Euro, British Pound, and Japanese Yen. The BBC reports that with its new rupee symbol, the Indian government is declaring itself a member in this elite class of world economies. As many as 36,000 entries in the rupee symbol contest were judged by a panel of artists, officials and bankers. A design from a design teacher at the Indian Institute of Technology was declared the winner. The winning prize was Rs 2.5 lakh which is about $ 5,350.

Billions spent to adopt euro symbol

Experts say implementing a new currency symbol is an costly process. Suite 101 reports that testing the symbol for technical applications like the web, banners and mobile phones is rigorous and difficult. Plus, it needs to be adaptable to computer keyboards and a large investment is required to print a new banknote design. The BBC article pointed out that to update computer systems to deal with the new euro symbol cost them upwards of $ 50 billion.

Discover more info

deccanchronicle.com

bbc.co.uk

suite101.com



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