1Free-lance designer. Post Graduate of Masters of Design Space, National Institute of Fashion Technology, New Delhi Campus
2Associate Professor, Senior Design faculty of National Institute of Fashion Technology, New Delhi
Online published on 15 March, 2019.
India, a developing nation, fastest growing economy in the world and is the third largest economy by Purchasing Power Parity. The country with extreme regional and cultural diversities needs strong financial activities for her development. Rupee, the Indian currency plays its own role in the process of progress. Indian currency has adjusted and transformed itself over the period of centuries with modifying situations and changing rulers. In due course of time, the system faces some problems which need to be irradiated. The present financial system is going through the same phase, facing a problem of counterfeiting of currency notes.
A major threat to an Indian economy, this Counterfeited money is artificial currency produced without the legal sanction of the state or the government. This money can be utilized for various unethical and anti-national activities such as smuggling, corruption, terror activities, drugs and human trafficking etc. With the advancement in the technology, it's becoming very easy for the counterfeiters to produce the fake currency resembling with present Indian currency notes.
The main aim of the study was to check the usefulness of the security features provided by RBI on bank note and to analyze depth of the problem of counterfeiting to which level it's been rooted in the system. At the end of the research it was found that, maximum of respondents were aware of at least one of the security features. But the awareness of the complex features was limited to only educated people or the people having businesses and other financial activities. Yet having such awareness people was facing the problem of counterfeiting and the problem was found to be existing with no major solution. Hence, possibilities of implementation of polymer notes were studied in an Indian scenario with enhanced security features.
At the end it can be concluded that, this study of security features and their usefulness on the ground level shall help the policymakers to decide what features to maintain and which one to remove while modifying the currency notes ’designs and making system more secure and sustainable.
Indian currency notes, Counterfeiting, Security features, Counterfeit detection, Polymer currency
