Republic India Coins, Proof Set, Currencies: [DS11] 1 Rupee

Definitive Coins - One Rupee - Part 3

This topic is organized in multiple posts. The post along with the previous post deals about the steel issues

Part One: Nickel and Cupro Nickel Large and small Issues
Part Two: Steel Issue
Part Three: This post

The adoption of Rupee symbol meant new designs. To avoid the controversy associated with the older designs, the time tested floral design was adopted. Apart for adoption of the Rupee Symbol, the size of the coins was reduced to the size of the old 50 paise coin. The edges have partial serrations.

The first coins introduced has a Thick Rupee symbol on this, this was minted by all the 4 mints in the first year, i.e. 2001. However a new die was introduced later in the same year, to make the Rupee symbol more thinner and this was used by Mumbai, Kolkata and Hyderabad in the Year 2011. From 2012 onwards all mints used this new die. The same die variety also exists in Rs 2 denomination.

Definitive Coins - One Rupee - Part 2

This topic is organized in multiple posts. The post deals about the steel issues

Part One: Nickel and Cupro Nickel Large and small Issues
Part Two: This Post
Part Three: Steel Issues from New Floral Design

The Rs 1 denomination gave way to Steel to control the costs. Although steel was introduced for values below one rupee in 1988, for denomination of Rs 1 it took 4 more years. The coins were minted from 1992. It was only in 2004 that the Rs 2 coins were minted in steel.

Amongst the most controversial coins of the times, the Unity in Diversity theme was adopted for the Definitive coins. The Rs 1 was struck with a date of 2004 to 2006 and the only coin for the year 2004. The Rs 2 coin was most widely available in circulation. The Rs 5 was struck with only one date of 2007 from Kolkata mint. Although the coins were struck only for a brief period of 3 years, there are quite a few die variations and other mysteries. The best being the Orientation of the Obverse with respect to the Reverse.

Die Varieties:

The 2004 Mumbai, 2005 Kolkata & Hyderabad come in 2 Orientation of obverse and Reverse. This would be the only design where we have multiple orientation for the same coin. There are also Die Rotation errors that are in between the above 2 orientations.

The Hyderabad mint also has a mint mark variety.

This is only design in the republic coinage that has the value written in words in both English; i.e. “One in English” and “Ek in Hindi” on the Reverse. The only other design where value is spelt out in Hindi are the 1964 designs after dropping of the word “Naya”.

The controversial “Unity in Diversity” design soon gave way to other designs. On the coins of 50 paise, Rs 1 and Rs 2, the Mudra design was adopted and on Rs 5 and Rs 10 the “Connectivity and IT” design was adopted. For more on these 3 designs, read the article “A Tale of 3 Designs”

The design on Rs 1 was Hand Gesture from Bharat Natyam, “Shikhara” meaning Heroism.

Even this design survived only for a brief period from 2007 to 2011.

The Mudra design is the only time when the designated Obverse does not have a Value on it. Typically in the Indian Definitive Coinage, the Obverse was always the side with Value. The Reverse was the common design side. However in the Mudra series, the Reverse is different for different denomination where as the Obverse is same / similar.

Definitive Coins - One Rupee - Part 1

This topic is organized in multiple posts. The post deals about the cupro-nickel issues

Part One: This Post
Part Two: Steel Issue
Part Three: Steel Issues from New Floral Design

The Rs 1 struck in 1950 and 1954 are covered as part of Anna Series. This post covers the decimal series.

First Series
In the Definitive Decimal series, initially the Rupee coin was not minted regularly. The Rupee notes were still popular in the initial days. The First design was similar to the earlier Pre-Decimal design. The coins were bigger in size and used the wheat corns on the front sides. This particular coin was minted only in 2 years, Year 1962 and 1970. The coin of 1970 is rare as its mintage is supposed to be low.

There is no Rs 1 coins struck from 1971 to 1974. However for the year 1971 to 1974 [and till 1979] these coins were struck in Proof and were part of the proof sets. Note there are quite a few fakes of this being sold in the market. Refer to the article on Fake Coins

Second Series
The second design was from 1975 to 1982. It essentially was same in the previous design except for the metal used, to reduce the cost, the metal was changed from Pure Nickel to an alloy of Cupro-Nickel. Although the size was kept same, the weight of the coin got reduced to 8 grams. This was also the first time the Kolkata mint created a new Lion [Ashoka Emblem] master die for Reverse. There are quite a few years when the coins were minted using different Reverse dies giving rise to Die Varieties. There are also Reeded Edges reported for few years.

Image Credits: Joeshp Kunnappally

Image Credits: Ponpandi Perumal

In what can be seen quality of minting, there is only one Edge Varities found in these coins. All coins have Security edges. It can also be a case of collectors not finding any other years yet.

Milled Edge
Year	Mint
1978	Mumbai
1979	Kolkata
1980	Kolkata
1981	Mumbai

Third Series

As the cost of metal continued to increase, the size of the coins were reduced. The One rupee coin was made to 6 grams from 8 grams. The Key elements of the design remained same. An septagon ring was introduced on both side of the coin.The Die Varieties continued with quite a few variations, the Security edge gave way to reeded edge from 1988 before the design gave way to Steel in 1991. In these 3 years we have coins of both reeded and security edge.

KM#79.1 - Normal Lion with Security edge
KM#79.2 - Normal lion with Lion pedestal different, more detailed with Security edge
KM#79.3 - Lions' chest hairs Restyled with Security edge
KM#79.4 - Normal Lion with Reeded edge
KM#79.5 - Lions' chest hairs restyled with Reeded edge