§ 11. Mr. TOUCHEasked whether the hon. Gentleman is now in a position to give any further information regarding the recent consideration of the question of the establishment of a mint for the coinage of gold in India?
§ Mr. H. BAKERThe Government of India proposed in a dispatch to the Secretary of State dated 16th May, 1912, to open the Bombay Mint to the coinage of sovereigns. Under the British and Indian Coinage Acts, any mint used for the coinage of sovereigns for circulation in the United Kingdom or in India must be constituted a branch of the Royal Mint. The Secretary of State proposed to the Treasury that this status should be given to the Bombay Mint; but the Treasury stipulated that, if this were done, the Bombay Mint should pass under Imperial management. As an alternative they were willing that a separate mint, with a separate staff, should be established. The first alternative would have been inconvenient and the second expensive. The Secretary of State therefore suggested to the Government of India, in a dispatch dated 18th October, that instead of sovereigns, of which large amounts reach India in the course of trade, Indian gold coins of the denomination of, say, ten rupees should be coined at Bombay. The Government of India desire time to consider the matter carefully.