RBI note printing units to explore feasibility of minting foreign currency

BRBNMPL attained peak production of printing 50 million currency notes per day during the pandemic.  | Photo Credit: Getty Images/iStockphoto

Bharatiya Reserve Bank Note Mudran Pvt. Ltd., a wholly owned subsidiary of the RBI and which caters to the demand of the currency notes of the country, is exploring the feasibility of printing foreign currency notes.

This is due to the rise in the use of digital currency in the country that could reduce the demand for physical notes leaving the printing units in the country with surplus capacity.

This was indicated by R.K. Labh, Senior General Manager, BRBNMPL, Mysuru, who was one of the guests at the CSIR Foundation Day and World Food Day celebrations at the Central Food Technological Research Institute (CFTRI) on Tuesday.

Mr. Labh said in the days ahead there could be challenges for physical currency with the use of digital currency and the BRBNMPL may venture to produce currency notes of other countries.

He said BRBNMPL attained peak production of printing 50 million currency notes per day during the pandemic and it was higher than the annual currency production of several countries.

Mr. Lhab said the Learning and Development Centre (LDC) at the BRBNMPL Mysuru campus and whose foundation was laid by the RBI Director Shaktikanta Das early this year, would be state-of-the-art in terms of learning, research and knowledge dissemination and would cater to the requirements of other countries as well.

Mr. Labh said the Mysuru unit also had a design studio and the new Mahatma Gandhi series of currency notes was designed by this unit. He said a few more new designs are in the pipeline. ‘’Mysuru plant is the only unit which produces both ink and paper for note printing besides printing the currencies,” he added.

The BRBNMPL has two units, one in Mysuru and the other in Salboni in West Bengal, and these are in addition to government owned presses at Nashik in Maharashtra and Dewas in Madhya Pradesh.

A new unit of BRBNMPL was also coming up in Balasore in Odisha, said Mr. Labh and he pointed out that there was a time when 98% of the currency note requirements were imported. But in the present times only 2% of the requirements were being imported, according to Mr. Labh, who underlined the extent of indigenisation that had taken place in the country’s note printing capabilities and the reduction on dependency on foreign countries.