Tales of the Rupee

This talk traces the rupee’s five-hundred-year journey across India and beyond, from 1538 to its modern, digital forms. Drawing on a landmark exhibition and the accompanying publication, Odyssey of the Rupee: From India to the World, the session explores how a single denomination carries within it entire histories of economics, commerce, empire, and identity. What can a coin, passed from hand to hand across centuries, still tell us about where we come from?
Bringing perspectives of numismatists, economists, and historians from the book, the talk examines coinage as more than just currency, but rather as evidence; a material record of the political and economic forces that have shaped our reality. Marking the Republic of India’s rupee at seventy-five years, the session situates this anniversary within a far longer arc, inviting the audience to see the coin in their pocket as the latest chapter in a story centuries in the making.
In collaboration with:

Venue: Seminar Halls


A History from 1538 to the Present
RSVP here (https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeyNbFZhow5xn5aRhamCkyTp2EbbIxZr3gHQRrAbz-0UzwTbQ/viewform?usp=publish-editor)
*Speaker*: Shailendra Bhandare
*Event Categories*: Heritage, History, Society