Press Information Bureau

Government of India

Ministry of Finance

25-November-2016 17:19 IST

The Indian banknotes are printed in two languages, English and Hindi. In addition, the other languages printed on the language panel of the Indian notes are Assamese, Bengali, Gujarati, Kannada, Kashmiri, Konkani, Malayalam, Marathi, Nepali, Oriya, Punjabi, Sanskrit, Tamil, Telugu and Urdu. Inclusion of languages on Banknotes is more a part of design and a matter of convention and in terms of Section 25 of RBI Act 1934, “The design, form and material of banknotes shall be such as may be approved by the Central Government after consideration of the recommendations made by the Central Board”.

This was stated by Shri Arjun Ram Meghwal, Minister of State in the Ministry of Finance in written reply to a question in Lok Sabha today.

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DSM/KA

Banknote design approval requires statutory procedure, enabling inclusion of multiple regional languages on currency notes. The design, form and material of banknotes are subject to approval by the Central Government after consideration of recommendations by the Central Board under Section 25 of the RBI Act, 1934, and inclusion of multiple regional languages on the language panel is a matter of design and convention within that approval framework.