New Delhi: The government is in talks for a joint venture with Royal Canadian Mint, to start production of plated coins in India amid continued anecdotal reports of shortages of small change across India.
While the Reserve Bank of India, or RBI, has placed a record order of 5.5 billion pieces with the government mint this year, the Security Printing and Minting Corp, the agency in charge of minting coins and printing currency notes, is also looking at an alternative metal composition other than ferritic stainless steel, the non-corrosive steel grade that is currently used for coin manufacturing.
“We are in talks with Royal Canadian Mint,” confirmed Arvind Mayaram, the corporation’s chairman and joint secretary in the ministry of finance. “We are also looking at different metal composition, which will not encourage and result in temptation to counterfeit.”
If a deal goes through, Royal Canadian Mint will tie up with its Indore-based partner, Mittal Appliances Ltd, which is currently manufacturing coin blanks for the new bimetallic Rs10 coin, due to be released by end of this year.
Pitching in: Jindal steel plant in Hisar. The government mint’s supply for stainless steel coin blanks is supplemented by private producers, such as the Steel Authority of India and JSL. Rajeev Dabral / Mint
Mittal Appliances, which manufactures non-ferrous sheet coil, has been producing metal coin blanks for Royal Canadian Mint for the past five years for supply to Thailand and the Dominican Republic.
“Multi-plated coins, which is yet to be introduced in India, has an electronic signature which makes the products more secure, difficult to counterfeit and easier for vending machines to detect,” said Dinesh Mittal, chairman.
Plated coins, a patented technology of the Canadian company, are in circulation in Canada, Singapore, New Zealand and The Philippines.
A month ago, the Security Printing completed reviewing the Royal Canadian Mint’s patented process, also known as “multi-ply plated technology” for its ability to use several layers of metals, including nickel and copper, with mild steel as the base.
The life of a coin is said to be about 15 years and India introduced stainless steel coins back in the late 1980s to counter rising nickel prices. In March 2007, the government switched to stainless steel for production of the chubby Rs5 cupro-nickel coins, as copper and nickel prices zoomed.
The government mint’s supply for stainless steel coin blanks is supplemented by private producers, such as the Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) and JSL Ltd (formerly Jindal Stainless Ltd), which have made considerable investments on coin blanks. About 20% of the government’s coin blank requirements are outsourced. SAIL’s Salem plant produces 3,500 tonnes of blank coins a year (one million Re1 coins need 4.85 tonnes).