366 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
might not have been felt as severely as it was. But there was no credit money worth the name. The Government issued interest-bearing Treasury notes, which formed a part of the circulating medium of the country. But, apart from being insignificant in amount,* these Treasury notes had
“proved a failure, owing, firstly, to the condition that they would not be received in payment of revenue for twelve months; secondly, they would be paid off or received only where issued, so that as the issues were confined to Calcutta, Madras and Bombay, their use and employment for purposes of circulation were limited to those cities …… and lastly, because their amounts were too large and their period of running at interest too short.”†
Nor was banking so widely developed as to satisfy the currency needs of comerce. The chief hindrance to its growth was the attitude of the Court. Being itself a commercial body largely dealing in exchange, the Court was averse to the development of banking institutions lest they should prove rivals. As this traditional policy of hostility continued even after the Court had ceased to be a body of merchant princes, banks did not grow with the growth of trade. Indeed, as late as 1856 banks in India numbered few and their issues were small, as shown in the table on page 367. (Table V)
The insufficiency of silver and the want of credit currency caused such an embrrassment to trade that there grew up a change in the attitude toward the Currency Act of 1835, and people for once, began to ask whether, although it was well to have changed from bimetallism to monometallism, it would not have been better to have preferred gold monometallism to silver monometallism. As more and more of gold was imported and coined, the stronger grew the demand for giving it a legal
- Amount of Indian Treasury notes outstanding :—
On April 30, 1850 £804,988
On April 30, 1851 802,036
On April 30, 1852 770,301 Extracted from Table No. 2 of the Return
On April 30, 1853 850,432 relating to East India Revenues, etc.,
On April 30, 1854 850,627 Parliamentary paper 201, VIII, 1858.
On April 30, 1855 889,875
On April 30, 1856 967,711 † How to meet the Financial Difficulties of India, by A. C. B., London, 1859, p. 13. This is in many ways a most remarkable pamphlet, which suggested many of the later reforms in Indian currency and banking.