INDIAN RUPEE GOT IT'S NEW IDENTITY (SYMBOL)

INDIAN RUPEE

The unique symbol--a blend of the Devanagri 'Ra' and Roman 'R' -- is designed by Bombay IIT post-graduate D Udaya Kumar, was approved by the Cabinet today

Kumar has been appointed as an Assistant Professor in the design department, IIT-Guwahati director Gautam Barua said in Guwahati on Thursday.

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Udaya Kumar, a PhD from IIT-Mumbai, was to join the Institute today but would instead do so tomorrow, he said. Kumar's entry was chosen from among 3,000 designs competing for the symbol and he will get an award of Rs 2.5 lakh from the Finance Ministry.

The new Rupee symbol was approved by the Union Cabinet today and the government will try to adopt it within six months in the country and globally within 18 to 24 months, Information and Broadcasting Minister Ambika Soni told reporters in Delhi.

Though the symbol will not be printed or embossed on currency notes or coins, it would be included in the 'Unicode Standard' and major scripts of the world to ensure that it is easily displayed and printed in the electronic and print media, she said.

Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia on Thursday said the rupee symbol approved by the Cabinet needs to be incorporated into typewriters and computer keyboards to enable its better day-to-day usage.

"It's quite a nice symbol. This thing (the rupee symbol) has to be brought into current usage. The most important thing is to make sure that in typewriters the symbol is somewhere there," he said here after a meeting with Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee.

Ahluwalia said changes should be made in both hardware and software systems of computers "so that when I want the symbol in, it should be there".

The rupee will soon join the elite currencies like the US dollar, the euro, British pound and Japanese yen in having a distinct identity.