The value of currency depends on a plethora of factors and the worst can happen if users totally lose confidence in it. When the rupee touched its lowest value against the dollar recently, I was reminded of a story by Robert Kiyosaki. The German mark had become worthless much before the Second World War. An old woman on her way to buy a loaf of bread was pushing a wheelbarrow full of marks. When she stopped for a moment, her most precious possession, the wheelbarrow, got stolen and the useless currency was left littered all over.

When the rupee slides, NRIs have a field day. But only those who aggressively monitor the exchange rate and resort to some smart reflex action by availing an overseas loan and exchanging the foreign currency at the rupee’s worst moments stand to benefit. Currency management, therefore, is an art and a science.

Annas for uppuma

Before paisas came into vogue on April 1, 1957, annas were used. One rupee comprised 192 pice. The denominations then were pice, quarter-anna, half-anna, one anna, two anna, four anna, eight anna or half-a-rupee, and rupee. A rupee consisted of 16 annas or 64 quarter-annas. Those days, I am told, two annas were enough to buy a sumptuous tiffin.

My mother says her younger brother Ramanathan, studying in the fourth or fifth standard during the late fifties, was a very picky eater. Many items were on his ‘hate’ list with rice uppuma topping it. If he smelt rice uppuma when he got back from school, he would immediately become a force to reckon with. It was my mother who devised a way to cool him down. She arranged two annas for him whenever tiffin items that he despised figured in the menu so he could eat out. But my uncle was very thrifty even as a child and, skipping his evening tiffin, he put all his annas in a hundi . Over a couple of years his collection overflowed and every now and then, he counted his annas with delirious joy.

Bolt from the Blue

In April 1957, Indian coinage went decimal and annas were replaced with naya paise. A grace period was given to exchange the defunct annas. But no one in that large family that was more like a railway station with visitors steaming in and out every day realised that there was a deadline for the exchange.

One day, my uncle proudly displayed his ‘anna’ collection to his father’s friend. But when the friend broke the news that all those coins were worthless, my uncle was shattered; he began crying piteously. All the money he had saved by virtually starving became junk.

When I see images on television of wailing people who have lost money at the hands of unscrupulous operators, I am reminded of my broken-hearted uncle, and of the need to exercise care with money.

Ramanathan uncle went on to complete his PhD and become a dazzling research scientist and a citizen of the US. Now in his sixties, the last time he visited us in Chennai, the tiffin menu was rice uppuma ! My mom apologised profusely to him. Uncle winked and said, “Never mind. Give me a US dollar in lieu of uppuma .”

“One US dollar in these troubled times of the INR ? No way. We can all go to a star hotel for dinner; that would be cheaper,” we shouted in unison!

(The author is AGM at Powertech Engineering LLC, Muscat. The views are personal.)

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