Extracts from The India Office Records and Bombay Gazetteer

 

Bombay Gazetteer (1883), vol. ? Nasik p429

Chandore, in the district of Nasik – after 1800, when the mint was moved from the fort to the town, it continued to coin till 1829, when the coining of silver was stopped. Copper coining continued on a smaller scale till 1830, when the mint was abolished.

26th April 1820. Bombay Consultations, 26th April 1820. IOR P/408/45, p323.

Consideration given to a request to establish a mint at Ahmednuggur by Captain Gibbon. This was rejected on the grounds that a serving officer could not undertake such work and there were no plans to establish a Mint Master for the Deccan. He proposed coining:

 

Silver

 

Pure Silver

Alloy

Two Rupees

20

2

One Rupee

10

1

Half Rupee

In the above proportions

Quarter Rupee

Two Annas

 

Copper

Two Pice

One Pice

Half Pice

 

He compares his proposal with the costs at Poona and gives the mint establishment there.

 

 

Rs

2 Hammermen

12

1 Stamp Holder

9

2 Billow Boys

30

3 Coolies

18

1 Smith

9

1 Bhistee

10

I Engraver of Stamps

22

5 Peons

30

2 Carkoons

35

Sundries

25

Rs

200

 

He submitted a specimen of a rupee and a pice

29th February 1832. Bombay Consultations, 29th February 1832. IOR P/411/51.

Letter from the Principal Collector of Ahmednuggur to Government, dated 15th November 1831.

In summary he stated: with regard to the new copper quarter annas please refer to my letter of 10th November 1831.

He received 15,000 rupees worth of the new coins on 1st November and distributed them to the various treasuries. The public was notified that they would receive them at the rate of 62 per rupee but no one had taken any in the five days that they had been available.

With regard to comparative values, then if the intrinsic value is taken as 100, the new quarter anna is 67.

27th November 1833. Bombay Consultations, 27th November 1833. India Office Records P/409/28, No. 651.

From the Collector of Ahmednuggur dated 4th November 1833.

With reference to your letter dated 4th May last regarding the custom of stamping coins in subordinate treasuries and directing me to prohibit such a practice in all the treasuries in this zillah, I have the honor to annex, to be laid before Government, copy of a letter from Mr Andrews, 1st Assistant Collector at Nassick, detailing his proceedings in consequence of these instructions.

I apprehend Mr Andrews has misunderstood the instructions of Government by stopping the mints at Chandore and Nassick, but I beg to solicit the instructions of Government on this point.

I beg leave to annex for the information of Government copy of a letter from Mr Wilkins, sub collector at Nassick, dated 20th January 1820, reporting the practice in regard to these mints, and also copy of a letter dated 25th January 1820 from Colonel H Pottinger then Collector at Ahmednuggur to the Commissioner in the Deccan, with copies of translations of reports from the Kumavisdars of Chandore and Nassick.

The Chandore rupee is coined at Chandore and the Jerryputka at Nassick, and both are in circulation in this zillah, as well as in other parts of the Deccan, and some inconvenience will, I imagine, be experienced by the deficiency in the circulation which will be created by these mints being stopped.

The Chandore mint coined last year 183,928 and the Nassick mint 69,383 and yielded a revenue to Government of 1358.2.66.

There is also a mint for coining copper at Chandore which coined 27,050 rupees and yielded a revenue to Government of 103. .64 last year.

There then follows a letter from the 1st Assistant Collector saying that he has stopped the mints.

Letter from W. Wilkins to Captain H. Pottinger (Collector of Ahmednuggur) dated 20th January 1820

I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 1st instant with an enclosure from the Commissioners calling upon me to report whether the mints of Nassick and Chandore were under our immediate control or farmed out for a stated period.

In reply I beg leave to state that the mints of both places are not farmed out, but the business of coinage is entrusted to natives who pay a percentage to Government upon the number of rupees coined, and consequently the operations at both these mints can be suspended whenever it is the pleasure of Government to have recourse to that measure, and I should conceive that there could not be any inconvenience whatever in placing the mints under the control of the Committee in Bombay provided any benefit is contemplated by that arrangement.

The only control exercised at present by Government over the mint master is that whenever the operation of coining takes place, one of the Carcoons of the Kumavisdar’s establishment with a peon or two is present to take an account of the number of coins which are struck during the day and who, when the days work is over, locks up the dies and the keys are deposited with the Kumavisdar.

There then follows letters including answers from the Kumavisdars about how the mint is run.

Letter from Government to the Collector at Ahmednuggur dated 22nd November 1833.

Confirms that Mr Andrews has misunderstood and goes on:

The mints at Nassick and Chandore, I am directed by His Lordship in Council to state, should be reopened, as otherwise inconvenience may arise from the want of Chandore and Jurreeputtee rupees in Candeish and Gungthurree.

18th December 1833. Bombay Consultations, 18th December 1833. IOR P/409/28.

No. 725, apology from Andrews for closing the mints.

No. 726, apology accepted by Government.

No. 728, resolution dated 16th December 1833 in reply to petitioners of Chandore, that the Chandore mint has been reopened.

Bombay Gazetteer. Bombay Gazetteer, vol. XII, Khandesh. Government Press Bombay, 1880, p195..

The Chandore rupee coined at the Chandore mint in Nasik (this mint started about 175 years ago was closed soon after the British conquest), was current at the beginning of British rule, but it has now disappeared.

 

Candeish

29th February 1832. Bombay Consultations, 29th February 1832. IOR P/411/51.

Letter from the Collector of Candeish to Government, dated 11th July 1831.

He enclosed five types of pice then current in his collectorate. He stated that the Chandore rupee was the current silver coin. 29 ½ of pice numbered 1, 2, 3 & 4 go to one rupee. He thought that it would be difficult to get the new quarter annas into circulation because they had been ordered to pass at 62 to the rupee, which was equivalent to 31 of the current pice (as opposed to 29 ½).

 

Sholapoor

31st December 1833. Bombay Consultations, 13th December 1833. IOR P/409/28.

Letter from the Mint Committee to Government dated 13th December 1833.

…If however the debased coin must be withdrawn from circulation and their place supplied with a better currency, and if the gradual introduction of the new Bombay rupee cannot be effected sufficiently speedily, we see not much objection to the temporary establishment of a mint at Sholapoor to be employed in coining Ankoosee rupees from the Bellapoore, and in order to supply the latter for coinage, we are of opinion that the Collector should be authorized to purchase them in the market (at no higher rate of course than the equivalent of their intrinsic value in other rupees) as the funds at his command will permit...