§ SIR J. GORSTI beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for India whether it is true, as reported in The Times of 8th January, that the Native State of Partabghar, with 80,000 inhabitants, is minting silver at the rate of Rs.800,000 a day, while a still smaller State is pouring out Rs.500,000 a day; and that the present issue of these States in a single day exceeds the whole coinage during the past 30 years; whether this action of the Native States accounts for the large importation of silver into India, since the coinage of the rupee in the Mints of the Government of India has been stopped; whether the whole purpose of this stoppage will be frustrated if the free coinage of silver in all the Native Mints in India is carried on at the same rate as in Partabghar; and what steps the Secretary of State 1339 proposes to take in order to counteract the proceedings of the Native States?
§ SIR J. GORSTI will put another question to-morrow.
§ SIR D. MACFARLANE (Argyll)Are these rupees legal tender in British India?
MR. GEORGE RUSSELLThe rupees in question form a part of the currency of India, but they are not a legal tender.