The March Of Money: Part XII

No Have Change – Will Slice Into Half

One never knows when one’s life can take a sudden turn into uncharted territory. I am making amazing discoveries, as a result of my recent interest in the history of coinage in Bhutan, and how currency evolved in the country. And, here too, I am yet again discovering the utter callousness of the Bhutanese attitude.

Starting from the very first milled silver coins of 1928 to the present, our coins and currency notes have been full of mistakes - every one of them. Ninety-one years since modern coinage began, the mistakes remain uncorrected.

It was the legendary American radio amateur Gus Browning who first broke the news of Bhutan’s braking dogs problem to the Western world when he filed a report about his experience at the Paro Tsechu in 1965. The problem today is even more severe than it was 54 years back. Typical! But today I want to speak of something that is very interesting.

I know that very, very few readers would have heard of what I am going to tell. My relentless search for old Bhutanese coins and information about them resulted in my finding the following strangely shaped coin. It is a silver coin.

Cut into half to convert to small change

I did not know what to make of it. Thus I sent an image of it to my consultant/expert Wolfgang in Germany. To my utter consternation, he explained as follows:

“Your coin is a cut Tangka of Pratap Simha, second Shah King who ruled from Kathmandu, Nepal. It was cut (most probably in Tibet) to make small change and represents 1 Shokang or 2/3 of Tangka.”

What he is saying is that the Tibetans would cut up a coin to convert it into half or one third/fourth value of the original coin. This means if they needed a Thala (half a Tikru) they would slice the coin into half. And if they wanted a Shiki, they would cut up the coin into 4 equal parts.

Nepalese coins were legal tender in Tibet. But the Tibetans were naughty and cut up the Nepalese coins - to turn them into small change. Ofcourse the Nepalese did not like the idea. It resulted in the Treaty of Khasa of 1790AD in which it was agreed that “mohars issued by Shri Shri Shri Shri Shri Gorkha (Maharajadhiraja) shall not be cut into small parts”.

The fact that I have been able to find this cut coin here in the country would mean that these were in use in Bhutan as well, along with all the other coins from Assam, British India, China, Cooch Bihar French India and Tibet. Meaning even Nepalese coins were legal tender in Bhutan.