First time ever: Govt to come out with Rs 20 coins
New Delhi, Mar 7: The Government will come out with the first ever Rs 20 coin which will be shaped like a 12-edged polygon with design of grains to denote farm dominance in the country.
Besides, new series of one, two, five and ten rupees coins too would be minted, which will be circular in design and have denominations written in Hindi script.
Later in a tweet, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said, Prime Minister Narendra Modi Thursday released the new series Rs 1, Rs 2, Rs 5, Rs 10 and Rs 20 coins.
"These coins contain design features which will be of great assistance to visually impaired persons," Jaitley said.
He further said, the Government, in 2015, had released a new series of banknotes which incorporated braille like signs for the benefit of visually impaired persons.
Economic Affairs Secretary Subhash Chandra Garg said, the new coins would be easily distinguishable from old coins.
The exact date of issuance of these new series coins is yet to be announced.
The Rs 20 coin will weigh 8.54 gm and its outside diameter will be 27mm with the outer ring made of nickel silver and the centerpiece of Nickel brass, a finance ministry notification said.
The face of the new Rs 20 coin shall bear the 'Lion Capital of Ashoka Pillar' with 'Satyameva Jayate' inscribed below. The left periphery will have the word 'Bharat' in Hindi and the right periphery will have the word 'India' in English.
The reverse side of the coin would have the denominational value '20' in the international numerals along with the Rupee symbol.
"The design of grains depicting the agricultural dominance of the country is flanked on the left periphery of the coin," the notification said.
The year of minting in international numerals shall be shown on centre of left periphery of the coin, it added.
According to the notification the new Rs 10 coin will have a outside diameter of 27 mm and weigh 7.74 gm, while the Rs 5 coin will have a diameter of 25 mm and weight of 6.74 gms.
The new series one rupee and two rupees coin will weigh 3.09 gm and 4.07 gm, while the diameter would be 20 mm and 23 mm respectively.
The face of all these coins shall bear the Lion Capital of Ashoka Pillar with the 'Satyameva Jayate' inscribed below, flanked on the left periphery with the word 'Bharat' in Hindi and on the right periphery with the word 'India" in English.
As per Coinage Act, 1906, the Government of India has the sole right to mint coins and the responsibility for coinage vests with the Government. The designing and minting of coins in various denominations is also the responsibility of the Government.
Coins are minted at the four India Government Mints at Mumbai, Alipore (Kolkata), Saifabad (Hyderabad), Cherlapally (Hyderabad) and Noida (UP).
The coins are issued for circulation only through the Reserve Bank in terms of the RBI Act.
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MP cruise boat tragedy: Search ops expanded to trace four missing passengers
Jabalpur (PTI): Army divers and disaster response teams on Saturday expanded their search at Bargi Dam in Madhya Pradesh to locate a man and three children still missing after the cruise boat tragedy that claimed nine lives two days ago, officials said.
With 28 of the 41 identified passengers onboard the ill-fated cruise boat rescued safely, police are preparing to register an FIR in connection with the accident that occurred at the reservoir in Jabalpur district on Thursday evening, they said.
The search radius has been expanded to 5 km in the backwaters of the Bargi Dam, located downstream of the Narmada River, area sub-divisional officer of police (SDOP) Anjul Ayank Mishra told PTI.
Nine people drowned in the incident, while 28 were rescued, and efforts are ongoing to trace the missing persons, he said.
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According to the police, more than 200 rescuers, including around 20 Army divers airlifted from Agra, began the search operation at 5 am on Saturday to trace Kamraj, an employee of the Ordnance Factory in Khamaria, his son Tamil (5), Vijay Soni (6) and Mayuram (5).
Mishra said that an inquest case has been registered and the post-mortem of nine deceased persons has been completed.
"Our priority is to search for the missing persons. We will soon register an FIR," he said.
Investigators have said that CCTV footage near the boarding point showed 43 people heading towards the ill-fated boat, and the names of 41 persons, who boarded the vessel, have been ascertained so far.
Collector Raghvendra Singh confirmed that a search is underway for four missing persons.
The rescue operation, being carried out by the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), State Disaster Response Force (SDRF) and local divers, was briefly affected around 9 am due to strong winds.
The state government on Friday ordered a probe into the incident and dismissed three crew members after survivors alleged negligence and safety lapses, including failure to provide life jackets.
The government also banned the operation of similar vessels in the state.
The boat, operated by the state tourism department, sank during a sudden storm around 6 pm on Thursday, and the wreckage was retrieved from the dam water on Friday, after the rescuers confirmed that there were no more bodies inside.
Eyewitnesses have said that strong winds made the water choppy, prompting passengers to raise an alarm and ask the crew to steer the vessel towards the riverbank.
A survivor alleged negligence by the crew and described a last-minute scramble for life jackets.
