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Checkpoint Solutions
Checkpoint for Section 6.1
6.1 Yes, but not nested
6.2 submit and reset
6.3 <input type="reset" value="let me start over">
6.4 <input type="submit" value ="send it off!">
6.5 <html>
<head>
<title>Checkpoint 6.5</title>
</head>
<body>
<form name = "problems" method = "post" action =
"mailto:[email protected]" enctype = "text/plain">
</form>
</body>
</html>
6.6 A CGI script is a program that tells the computer what to do with form data that is sent to it. It is
stored on a web server, in a cgi-bin folder.
Checkpoint for Section 6.2
6.7 All the names are different. For a radio button group to work, each button must have the same name as
the others.
6.8 function checkIt()
{ document.getElementById("agree").checked = true }
6.9 Textboxes can only have widths configured; textarea boxes can be set to however many rows
and columns are desired.
6.10
<html><head><title>Checkpoint 6.10</title>
<script>
function firstName(name)
{
var fname = document.getElementById(name).value;
document.getElementById('f_name').innerHTML = fname;
}
function lastName(name)
{
var lname = document.getElementById(name).value;
document.getElementById('l_name').innerHTML = lname;
}
</script>
</head>
<body>
<p>Enter your first name:<br />
<input type="text" name="firstname" size = "30" maxlength = "28"
id="firstname">
<input type ="button" onclick="firstName('firstname')" value =
"ok"></button></p>
<p>Enter your last name:<br />
<input type="text" name="lastname" size = "30" maxlength = "29"
id="lastname">
<input type ="button" onclick="lastName('lastname')" value =
"ok"></button></p>
<h3>Your first name: <span id = "f_name"> </span> </h3>
<h3>Your last name: <span id = "l_name"> </span> </h3>
</body></html>
6.11
<form name="myform" method="post" enctype="text/plain" action =
"mailto:[email protected]?Here is the requested
information&[email protected]">
6.12 Each control in the email is identified by its name. The user's selection is listed by the form
control's value.
Checkpoint for Section 6.3
6.13 answers will vary
6.14 add to web page <body>:
<input type ="hidden" name ="sides" id ="sides" value = "add lemon wedge
with salmon, ketchup with fries, dressing with salad " />
6.15 middle = username.substr(4,2);
6.16 var nameLength = username.length;
endChar = username.substr((nameLength – 1), 1);
6.17
<script>
function showWord(pword)
{
var username = document.getElementById(pword).value;
var nameLength = username.length;
var charOne = username.substr(0,1);
var charEnd = username.substr((nameLength - 1),1);
var middleLength = nameLength - 2;
var middle = "";
for (i = 0; i <= middleLength; i++)
middle = middle + "*";
var word = charOne + middle + charEnd;
alert(word);
}
</script>
</head>
<body>
<h3> Enter a password in the box below. </h3>
<p><input type="password" name="user_pwrd" id="passwrd" size =
""/>
<input type ="button" onclick="showWord('passwrd')" value =
"ok"></button></p>
</body>
6.18
<script>
function checkAmp(pword)
{
var checkSpecial = false;
var pword = document.getElementById(pword).value;
var nameLength = pword.length;
for (i = 1; i <= (nameLength - 1); i++)
{
if (pword.charCodeAt(i) == 38)
checkSpecial = true;
}
if (checkSpecial == false)
alert("You don't have an ampersand (&) in your password.");
else
alert("Ampersand (&) found!");
}
</script>
</head>
<body>
<h3> Enter a password in the box below. </h3>
<p><input type="password" name="user_pwrd" id="passwrd" size = ""/>
<input type ="button" onclick="checkAmp('passwrd')" value =
"ok"></button></p>
</body>
Checkpoint for Section 6.4
6.19 size
6.20 multiple
6.21 size = "1"
6.22 answers will vary
6.23 answers will vary
6.24
<select multiple = "multiple" name="cars" size = "2" id="cars">
<option>Ford</option>
<option>Chevrolet</option>
<option>Kia</option>
<option>Lexus</option>
<option>Mercedes Benz</option>
<option>Honda</option>
</select>
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Title: The Problem of the Rupee, Its Origin and Its Solution
Creator: B. R. Ambedkar
Release date: September 5, 2020 [eBook #63132]
Language: English
Credits: Produced by Joseph Koshy
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PROBLEM OF
THE RUPEE, ITS ORIGIN AND ITS SOLUTION ***
THE PROBLEM OF THE RUPEE
ITS ORIGINS AND ITS SOLUTION
BY
B. R. AMBEDKAR
Sometime Professor of Political Economy at the Sydenham College of
Commerce and Economics, Bombay.
LONDON
P. S. KING & SON, LTD.
ORCHARD HOUSE, 2 & 4 GREAT SMITH STREET
WESTMINSTER
1923
DEDICATED
TO THE MEMORY OF
MY
FATHER AND MOTHER
AS A TOKEN OF MY ABIDING GRATITUDE FOR THE
SACRIFICES THEY MADE AND THE ENLIGHTENMENT
THEY SHOWED IN THE MATTER OF MY EDUCATION.
Printed in Great Britain by Butler & Tanner Ltd., Frome and London
PREFACE
In the following pages I have attempted an exposition of the events
leading to the establishment of the exchange standard and an
examination of its theoretical basis.
In endeavouring to treat the historical side of the matter I have
carefully avoided repeating what has already been said by others.
For instance, in treating of the actual working of the exchange
standard I have contented myself with a general treatment just
sufficiently detailed to enable the reader to follow the criticism I
have offered. If more details are desired they are given in all their
amplitude in other treatises. To have reproduced them would have
been a work of supererogation; besides it would have only obscured
the general trend of my argument. But in other respects I have been
obliged to take a wider historical sweep than has been done by
other writers. The existing treatises on Indian currency do not give
any idea, at least an adequate idea, of the circumstances which led
to the reforms of 1893. I think that a treatment of the early history
is quite essential to furnish the reader with a perspective in order to
enable him to judge for himself the issues involved in the currency
crisis and also of the solutions offered. In view of this I have gone
into that most neglected period of Indian currency extending from
1800 to [pg vi] 1893. Not only have other writers begun abruptly the
story of the exchange standard, but they have popularised the
notion that the exchange standard is the standard originally
contemplated by the Government of India. I find that this is a gross
error. Indeed the most interesting point about Indian currency is the
way in which the gold standard came to be transformed into a gold
exchange standard. Some old but by now forgotten facts had
therefore to be recounted to expose this error.
On the theoretical side there is no book but that of Professor
Keynes which makes any attempt to examine its scientific basis. But
the conclusions he has arrived at are in sharp conflict with those of
mine. Our differences extend to almost every proposition he has
advanced in favour of the exchange standard. This difference
proceeds from the fundamental fact, which seems to be quite
overlooked by Professor Keynes, that nothing will stabilise the rupee
unless we stabilise its general purchasing power. That the exchange
standard does not do. That standard concerns itself only with
symptoms and does not go to the disease: indeed, on my showing,
if anything, it aggravates the disease.
When I come to the remedy I again find myself in conflict with
the majority of those who like myself are opposed to the exchange
standard. It is said that the best way to stabilise the rupee is to
provide for effective convertibility into gold. I do not deny that this is
one way of doing it. But I think a far better way would be to have an
inconvertible rupee with a fixed limit of issue. Indeed, if I had any
say in the matter I would propose that the Government of India
should melt the rupees, sell them as [pg vii] bullion and use the
proceeds for revenue purposes and fill the void by an inconvertible
paper. But that may be too radical a proposal, and I do not therefore
press for it, although I regard it as essentially sound. In any case the
vital point is to close the Mints not merely to the public, as they have
been, but to the Government as well. Once that is done I venture to
say that the Indian currency, based on gold as legal tender with a
rupee currency fixed in issue, will conform to the principles
embodied in the English currency system.
It will be noticed that I do not propose to go back to the
recommendations of the Fowler Committee. All those who have
regretted the transformation of the Indian currency from a gold
standard to a gold exchange standard have held that everything
would have been all right if the Government had carried out in toto
the recommendations of that Committee. I do not share that view.
On the other hand, I find that the Indian currency underwent that
transformation because the Government carried out those
recommendations. While some people regard that Report as classical
for its wisdom, I regard it as classical for its nonsense. For I find that
it was this Committee which, while recommending a gold standard,
also recommended and thereby perpetuated the folly of the
Herschell Committee, that Government should coin rupees on its
own account according to that most naïve of currency principles, the
requirements of the public, without realising that the latter
recommendation was destructive of the former. Indeed, as I argue,
the principles of the Fowler Committee must be given up if we are to
place the Indian currency on a stable basis. [pg viii]
I am conscious of the somewhat lengthy discussions on
currency principles into which I have entered in treating the subject.
My justification of this procedure is two-fold. First of all, as I have
differed so widely from other writers on Indian currency, I have
deemed it necessary to substantiate my view-point even at the cost
of being charged with over-elaboration. But it is my second
justification which affords me a greater excuse. It consists in the fact
that I have written primarily for the benefit of the Indian public, and,
as their grasp of currency principles does not seem to be as good as
one would wish it to be, an over-statement, it will be agreed, is
better than an understatement of the argument on which I have
based my conclusions.
Up to 1913, the Gold Exchange Standard was not the avowed
goal of the Government of India in the matter of Indian Currency,
and although the Chamberlain Commission appointed in that year
had reported in favour of its continuance, the Government of India
had promised not to carry its recommendations into practice till the
war was over and an opportunity had been given to the public to
criticize them. When, however, the Exchange Standard was shaken
to its foundations during the late war, the Government of India went
back on its word and restricted, notwithstanding repeated protests,
the terms of reference to the Smith Committee to recommending
such measures as were calculated to ensure the stability of the
Exchange Standard, as though that standard had been accepted as
the last word in the matter of Indian Currency. Now that the
measures of the Smith Committee have not ensured the stability of
the Exchange Standard, it is given [pg ix] to understand that the
Government, as well as the public, desire to place the Indian
Currency System on a sounder footing. My object in publishing this
study at this juncture is to suggest a basis for the consummation of
this purpose.
I cannot conclude this preface without acknowledging my deep
sense of gratitude to my teacher, Prof. Edwin Cannan, of the
University of London (School of Economics). His sympathy towards
me and his keen interest in my undertaking have placed me under
obligations which I can never repay. I feel happy to be able to say
that this work has undergone close supervision at his hands, and
although he is in no way responsible for the views I have expressed,
I can say that his severe examination of my theoretic discussions has
saved me from many an error. To Professor Wadia, of Wilson
College, I am thankful for cheerfully undertaking the dry task of
correcting the proofs. [pg x]
[pg xi]
FOREWORD
By Professor Edwin Cannan
I am glad that Mr. Ambedkar has given me the opportunity of saying
a few words about his book.
As he is aware, I disagree with a good deal of his criticism. In
1893 I was one of the few economists who believed that the rupee
could be kept at a fixed ratio with gold by the method then
proposed, and I did not fall away from the faith when some years
elapsed without the desired fruit appearing (see Economic Review,
July 1898, pp. 400—403). I do not share Mr. Ambedkar's hostility to
the system, nor accept most of his arguments against it and its
advocates. But he hits some nails very squarely on the head, and
even when I have thought him quite wrong, I have found a
stimulating freshness in his views and reasons. An old teacher like
myself learns to tolerate the vagaries of originality, even when they
resist “severe examination” such as that of which Mr. Ambedkar
speaks.
In his practical conclusion I am inclined to think he is right. The
single advantage offered to a country by the adoption of the gold-
exchange system instead of the simple gold standard is that it is
cheaper, in the sense of requiring a little less value in the shape of
metallic currency than the gold standard. But all that can be saved in
this way is a trifling amount, almost infinitesimal beside the
advantage of having a currency more difficult for [pg xii]
administrators and legislators to tamper with. The recent experience
both of belligerents and neutrals certainly shows that the simple gold
standard, as we understood it before the war, is not fool-proof, but it
is far nearer being fool-proof and knave-proof than the gold-
exchange standard. The percentage of administrators and legislators
who understand the gold standard is painfully small, but it is and is
likely to remain ten or twenty times as great as the percentage
which understands the gold-exchange system. The possibility of a
gold-exchange system being perverted to suit some corrupt purpose
is very considerably greater than the possibility of the simple gold
standard being so perverted.
The plan for the adoption of which Mr. Ambedkar pleads,
namely that all further enlargement of the rupee issue should be
permanently prohibited, and that the mints should be open at a fixed
price to importers or other sellers of gold, so that in course of time
India would have, in addition to the fixed stock of rupees, a currency
of meltable and exportable gold coins, follows European precedents.
In eighteenth-century England the gold standard introduced itself
because the legislature allowed the ratio to remain unfavourable to
the coinage of silver: in nineteenth-century France and other
countries it came in because the legislatures definitely closed the
mints to silver when the ratio was favourable to the coinage of silver.
The continuance of a mass of full legal tender silver coins beside the
gold would be nothing novel in principle, as the same thing, though
on a somewhat smaller scale, took place in France, Germany, and
the United States.
It is alleged sometimes that India does not want [pg xiii] gold
coins. I feel considerable difficulty in believing that gold coins of
suitable size would not be convenient in a country with the climate
and other circumstances of India. The allegation is suspiciously like
the old allegation that the “Englishman prefers gold coins to paper,”
which had no other foundation than the fact that the law prohibited
the issue of notes for less than £5 in England and Wales, while in
Scotland, Ireland, and almost all other English-speaking countries
notes for £1 or less were allowed and circulated freely. It seems
much more likely that silver owes its position in India to the decision
which the Company made before the system of standard gold and
token silver was accidentally evolved in 1816 in England, and long
before it was understood: and that the position has been maintained
not because Indians dislike gold, but because Europeans like it so
well that they cannot bear to part with any of it.
This reluctance to allow gold to go to the East is not only
despicable from an ethical point of view. It is also contrary to the
economic interest not only of the world at large, but even of the
countries which had a gold standard before the war and have it still
or expect soon to restore it. In the immediate future gold is not a
commodity the use of which it is desirable for these countries either
to restrict or to economize. From the closing years of last century it
has been produced in quantities much too large to enable it to retain
its purchasing power and thus be a stable standard of value unless it
can constantly be finding existing holders willing to hold larger
stocks, or fresh holders to hold new stocks of it. Before the war the
accumulation of hoards by [pg xiv] various central banks in Europe
took off a large part of the new supplies and prevented the actual
rise of general prices being anything like what it would otherwise
have been, though it was serious enough. Since the war the Federal
Reserve Board, supported by all Americans who do not wish to see a
rise of prices, has taken on the new “White Man's Burden” of
absorbing the products of the gold mines, but just as the United
States failed to keep up the value of silver by purchasing it, so she
will eventually fail to keep up the value of gold. In spite of the
opinion of some high authorities, it is not at all likely that a renewed
demand for gold reserves by the central banks of Europe will come
to her assistance. Experience must gradually be teaching even the
densest of financiers that the value of paper currencies is not kept
up by stories of “cover” or “backing” locked up in cellars, but by due
limitation of the supply of the paper. With proper limitation enforced
by absolute convertibility into gold coin which may be freely melted
or exported, it has been proved by theory and experience that small
holdings of gold are perfectly sufficient to meet all internal and
international demands. There is really more chance of a great
demand from individuals than from the banks. It is conceivable that
the people of some of the countries which have reduced their paper
currency to a laughing stock may refuse all paper and insist on
having gold coins. But it seems more probable that they will be
pleased enough to get better paper than they have recently been
accustomed to, and will not ask for hard coin with sufficient
insistence to get it. On the whole it seems fairly certain that the
demand of Europe and [pg xv] European-colonised lands for gold
will be less rather than greater than before the war, and that it will
increase very slowly or not at all.
Thus on the whole there is reason to fear a fall in the value of
gold and a rise of general prices rather than the contrary.
One obvious remedy would be to restrict the production of gold
by international agreement, thus conserving the world's resources in
mineral for future generations. Another is to set up an international
commission to issue an international paper currency so regulated in
amount as to preserve an approximately stable value. Excellent
suggestions for the professor's classroom, but not, at present at any
rate nor probably for some considerable period of time, practical
politics.
A much more practical way out of the difficulty is to be found in
the introduction of gold currency into the East. If the East will take a
large part of the production of gold in the coming years it will tide us
over the period which must elapse before the most prolific of the
existing sources are worked out. After that we may be able to carry
on without change or we may have reached the possibility of some
better arrangement.
This argument will not appeal to those who can think of nothing
but the extra profits which can be acquired during a rise of prices,
but I hope it will to those who have some feeling for the great
majority of the population, who suffer from these extra and wholly
unearned profits being extracted from them. Stability is best in the
long run for the community.
EDWIN CANNAN.
[pg xvii]
Contents
Author's Preface
Foreword by Professor Edwin Cannan
From a Double Standard to a Silver Standard
The Silver Standard and the Dislocation of its Parity
The Silver Standard and the Evils of Its Instability
Towards a Gold Standard
From A Gold Standard to a Gold Exchange Standard
Stability of the Exchange Standard
A Return to the Gold Standard
CHART I: Discount Rates in India
CHART II: Fall of the Rupee-Sterling Exchange
CHART III: Relative Values and Relative Production of Gold and
Silver
CHART IV: Prices and Wages in India and England, 1873–93
CHART V: Monthly Fluctuations of The Rupee-Sterling Exchange
CHART VI: Comparative Price Levels, Indian and Foreign, 1893–1922
[pg 1]
THE PROBLEM OF THE RUPEE
CHAPTER I
FROM A DOUBLE STANDARD TO A SILVER STANDARD
Trade is an important apparatus in a society based on private property and pursuit of individual gain;
without it, it would be difficult for its members to distribute the specialised products of their labour.
Surely a lottery or an administrative device would be incompatible with its nature. Indeed, if it is to
preserve its character, the only mode for the necessary distribution of the products of separate industry
is that of private trading. But a trading society is unavoidably a pecuniary society, a society which of
necessity carries on its transactions in terms of money. In fact, the distribution is not primarily an
exchange of products against products, but products against money. In such a society, money therefore
necessarily becomes the pivot on which everything revolves. With money as the focusing-point of all
human efforts, interests, desires and ambitions, a trading society is bound to function in a régime of
price where successes and failures are results of nice calculations of price-outlay as against price-
product.
Economists have no doubt insisted that “there cannot … be intrinsically a more significant thing
than money,” which at best is only “a great wheel by means of which every individual in society has his
subsistence, conveniences and amusements regularly distributed to him [pg 2] in their proper
proportions.” Whether or not money values are the definitive terms of economic endeavour may well be
open to discussion.1 But this much is certain, that without the use of money this “distribution of
subsistence, conveniences and amusements,“ far from being a matter of course, will be distressingly
hampered if not altogether suspended. How can this trading of products take place without money? The
difficulties of barter have ever formed an unfailing theme with all economists, including those who have
insisted that money is only a cloak. Money is not only necessary to facilitate trade by obviating the
difficulties of barter, but is also necessary to sustain production by permitting specialisation. For who
would care to specialise if he could not trade his products for those of others which he wanted? Trade is
the handmaid of production, and where the former cannot flourish the latter must languish. It is
therefore evident that if a trading society is not to be out of gear and is not to forego the measureless
advantages of its automatic adjustments in the great give-and-take of specialised industry, it must
provide itself with a sound system of money.2
At the close of the Moghul Empire, India, judged by the standards of the time, was economically an
advanced country. Her trade was large, her banking institutions were well developed, and credit played
an appreciable part in her transactions. But a medium of exchange and a common standard of value
were among others the most supreme desiderata in the economy of the Indian people when they came,
in the middle of the eighteenth century, under the sway of the British. Before the occurrence of this
event, the money of India consisted of both gold and silver. Under the Hindu emperors the emphasis
was laid on gold, while under the Mussalmans silver formed a large [pg 3] part of the circulating
medium.3 Since the time of Akbar, the founder of the economic system of the Moghul Empire in India,
the units of currency had been the gold mohur and the silver rupee. Both coins, the mohur and the
rupee, were identical in weight, i.e. 175 grs. troy,4 and were “supposed to have been coined without
any alloy, or at least intended to be so.”5 But whether they constituted a single standard of value or not
is a matter of some doubt. It is believed that the mohur and the rupee, which at the time were the
common measure of value, circulated without any fixed ratio of exchange between them. The standard,
therefore, was more of the nature of what Jevons called a parallel standard6 than a double standard.7
That this want of ratio could not have worked without some detriment in practice is obvious. But it must
be noted that there existed an alleviating circumstance in the curious contrivance by which the mohur
and the rupee, though unrelated to each other, bore a fixed ratio to the dam, the copper coin of the
Empire.8 So that it is permissible to hold that, as a consequence of being fixed to the same thing, the
two, the mohur and the rupee, circulated at a fixed ratio.
In Southern India, to which part the influence of the [pg 4] Moghuls had not extended, silver as a
part of the currency system was quite unknown. The pagoda, the gold coin of the ancient Hindu kings,
was the standard of value and also the medium of exchange, and continued to be so till the time of the
East India Company.
The right of coinage, which the Moghuls always held as inter jura Majestatis,9 be it said to their
credit was exercised with due sense of responsibility. Never did the Moghul Emperors stoop to debase
their coinage. Making allowance for the imperfect technology of coinage, the coins issued from the
various Mints situated even in the most distant parts of their Empire10 did not materially deviate from
the standard.
Weight Weight
Name of the Rupee in pure Name of the Rupee in pure
Grs. Grs.
Akabari of Lahore 175·0 Delhi Sonat 175·0
Akabari of Agra 174·0 Delhi Alamgir 175·0
Jehangiri of Agra 174·6 Old Surat 174·0
Jehangiri of Allahabad 173·6 Murshedabad 175·9
Jehangiri of Kandahar 173·9 Persian Rupee of 1745 174·5
Shehajehani of Agra 175·0 Old Dacca 173·3
Shehajehani of Ahamadabad 174·2 Muhamadshai 170·0
Shehajehani of Delhi 174·2 Ahamadshai 172·8
Weight Weight
Name of the Rupee in pure Name of the Rupee in pure
Grs. Grs.
Shehajehani of Delhi 175·0 Shaha Alam (1772) 175·8
Shehajehani of Lahore 174·0
[pg 5] The table on p. 4 of the assays of the Moghul rupees shows how the coinage throughout the
period of the Empire adhered to the standard weight of 175 grs. pure.11
So long as the Empire retained unabated sway there was advantage rather than danger in the
plurality of Mints, for they were so many branches of a single department governed by a single
authority. But with the disruption of the Moghul Empire into separate kingdoms these branches of the
Imperial Mint located at different centres became independent factories for purposes of coinage. In the
general scramble for independence which followed the fall of the Empire, the right to coinage, as one of
the most unmistakable insignia of sovereignty, became the right most cherished by the political
adventurers of the time. It was the last privilege to which the falling dynasties clung, and was also the
first to which the adventurers rising to power aspired. The result was that the right, which was at one
time so religiously exercised, came to be most wantonly abused. Everywhere the Mints were kept in full
swing, and soon the country was filled with diverse coins which, while they proclaimed the incessant
rise and fall of dynasties, also presented bewildering media of exchange. If these money-mongering
sovereigns had kept up their issues to the original standard of the Moghul Emperors the multiplicity of
coins of the same denomination would not have been a matter of much concern. But they seemed to
have held that as the money used by their subjects was made by them, they could do what they liked
with their own, and proceeded to debase their coinage to the extent each chose without altering the
denominations. Given the different degrees of debasement, the currency necessarily lost its primary
quality of general and ready acceptability.
The evils consequent upon such a situation may well be imagined. When the contents of the coins
belied the value indicated by their denomination they became mere merchandise and there was no
more a currency by tale to act as a ready means of exchange. The bullion value of each coin had to be
ascertained before it could be accepted as a final [pg 6] discharge of obligations.12 The opportunity for
defrauding the poor and the ignorant thus provided could not have been less13 than that known to have
obtained in England before the great re-coinage of 1696. This constant weighing, valuing, and assaying
the bullion contents of coins was, however, only one aspect in which the evils of the situation made
themselves felt. They also presented another formidable aspect. With the vanishing of the Empire there
ceased to be such a thing as an Imperial legal tender current all through India. In its place there grew
up local tenders current only within the different principalities into which the Empire was broken up.
Under such circumstances exchange was not liquidated by obtaining in return for wares the requisite
bullion value from the coins tendered in payment. Traders had to be certain that the coins were also
legal tender of their domicile. The Preamble to the Bengal Currency Regulation XXXV, of 1793, is
illuminating on this point. It says:—
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