2020-02-13 Thu

The period in which, India was enslaved and was ruled by foreigners. This land was divided into small sovereign Princely States and presidencies under the English Crown. Thus with it came the foreign coinage but still, there were many states which issued their coin like the state of Bikaner.

Bikaner is ruled by the royal lineage of Rathore Rajput, it was established by Rao Bikaji in between 1465 to 1504 AD. In the later period, Bikaner had a good relationship with the Great Mughal Empire through marriage alliance and there outstanding service in the Mughal Army.

Due to these ties with the Mughal Empire Bikaner state-issued many coins in the name of the Mughal emperor. But later on under British rule Bikaner acknowledge their authority over the coinage. Bikaner issued their mints but when British offer to issue coin for Princely state at no charges if they agreed to follow the British designs, Bikaner agreed. In 1894 and 1895 Queen Victoria’s portrait coin was issued in the reign of Maharaja Ganga Singh.

The above mention mints were for regular circulation but apart from this the state of Bikaner also used Nazarana silver rupee on the 50th anniversary of Maharaja Ganga Singh region. The obverse flan depicts the portrait of the king with Devanagari legend “Maharajadhiraja Sri Ganga Singhji Bahadur”.

The reverse flan depicts a fancy initial of ‘GS’ with a canopy above and a Devanagari legend “Raj Sri Bikaner / Ganga Shahi Ek Rupaya, with VS date 1994”.This silver rupee is heavier than the normal rupee (11.6gm) by 13 gm.

Image Courtesy: Classical Numismatic Auction