STABILITY OF THE EXCHANGE STANDARD 525
of the rupee, the only feasible solution was to have proposed the reduction of the fineness of the rupee. Had the Committee regarded silver as a commodity distinct from the rupee like any other commodity to be measured in terms of the rupee as a unit of account, probably it might have avoided committing the blunder which it did. But what is more than probable is that the Committee did not think that the general purchasing power of the rupee was a factor of any moment in the consideration of the matter it was asked to report upon. What was of prime importance in its eyes for the maintenance of the exchange value of the rupee was a favourable balance of trade, and that India had at the time the Committee drafted its Report. For the Committee, in the course of its general observations on the exchange standard, remarked :
“that the system had proved effectual in preventing the fall in the value of the rupee below 1s. 4d., and unless there should have been profound modifications in India’s position as an exporting country with a favourable trade balance, there was no reason to apprehend any breakdown in this respect.”*
Proceeding on this view of the question it was quite natural for the Committee to have argued that if a favourable balance of trade sustained 1s. gold exchange, why should a similar balance of trade not sustain 2s. gold exchange ?
Again, it is only on some such hypothesis that one can explain why the recommendations of the Committee were adopted at all when the necessity for their adoption had passed away. Even if the intrinsic value of the rupee exceeded its nominal value, there was no danger of a wholesale disappearance of the rupee from circulation in view of the enormous volume of rupees in India.† What would have taken place was not a wholesale melting of rupees, but a constant dribble of an irregular and illegal character leading to the contravention of the orders then issued by the Government of India against the melting or exportation of the rupee coin. At the time when the Committee reported (December, 1919) the price of silver was no doubt high, but it was certainly falling during 1920 when the Government
- Report, par. 33.
† Cf. evidence of Mr. Keynes before the Committee of 1919. Q. 2,665-68.