Fact Check: New Ayodhya currency released with Ram Rajya Mudra? Here’s the truth
Claim: The video shows the new Ayodhya currency with a Ram Rajya seal on it.
Fact: The claim is false. The video shows ‘Raam’ currency, which is not legal tender. ‘Ayodhya’ currency does not exist.
Hyderabad: A video showing ‘Raam’ currency is going viral on social media with the claim that it shows Ayodhya’s new currency.
In the video shared on Instagram, we can see a person showing ‘Lord Raam’ currency, saying it is the official currency of Maharishi Vedic City. He also says that this currency is used for transactions and the value of ‘Five Raam’ denomination is equal to 50 US Dollars.
The text on the video reads, “Ayodhya new currency… Ram Rajya Mudra… Jai Shree Ram”. The video was uploaded with the caption, “Ayodhya new currency. Should the currency in the name of Lord Ram should come into Bharat as well? (Translated from Hindi) (Archive)
Fact Check
NewsMeter found that the viral claim is false. The video does not show the Ayodhya currency. Ayodhya currency does not exist.
Keyword searches yielded no reports or social media posts indicating that Ayodhya currency exists. There are no reports of any central bank announcing its intentions to introduce an ‘Ayodhya’ currency.
Using a reverse image search, we found an extended version of the viral clip uploaded to YouTube on June 14, 2024. The video was uploaded by a channel named Desi Tourist with the title ‘Found a Hindu country but 99% Indians don't know about it? Desi Tourist Vlog.’ (Translated from Hindi)
The description of the video stated that it’s a part of a travel video taken during a road trip through the United States of America. The viral clip started from the 25:23-minute mark in the YouTube video.
From the information in the YouTube channel, we found that the person talking about the ‘Raam’ currency in the viral video is Amit Singh, a travel vlogger who uploads his videos on the Desi Tourist YouTube channel. The video description stated, “In this episode, I will take you to the magical land of Ram Rajya in America. A Land of Sanskrit Speaking people, land of Vedas & Vastu Shashtra, land of Bhagwan Ram currency note. Let’s go to Maharishi Vedic City, Iowa - the most progressive city in America based on Ayurveda. (sic)”
From the video, we understand that the ‘Raam’ currency is used in the Maharishi Vedic City of Iowa.
Using keyword searches, we found a Zee News report dated March 6, 2025, with the title ‘Lord Ram On Currency Note: THIS US City Has Currency Stronger Than Dollar; It’s Located In....’ The report stated that the ‘Raam’ currency was introduced in 2001 by the Global Country of World Peace (GCWP) with the goal of fostering global peace, progress, and prosperity.
“While primarily used in Maharishi Vedic City, it has also seen limited circulation in some European countries, particularly in the Netherlands,” added the report.
Is ‘Raam currency’ legal tender?
The Raam currency is available in the denominations of 1, 5 and 10, with each ‘Raam’ valued at 10 US Dollars.
According to the Times of India report published on the same date with the title ‘This place in the US has the Ram Rajya Currency in Circulation’, ‘Raam’ currency is a bearer bond not legal tender.
TOI stated that the ‘Raam’ currency is more of an instrument of investment, rather than a regular transaction: “…bearer bonds are usually issued by corporate houses or governments to collect funds, hence it is basically a debt instrument. However, no record of the investor is kept by the bank, hence the currency holds no legal tender.”
NewsMeter spoke to Amit Singh, who confirmed that the ‘Raam’ currency is not related to Ayodhya or any place in India. He added, “It is a conceptual currency from a Vedic-based small town in America.”
Amit Singh informed NewsMeter that he wrote a comment in the viral video, “I asked them to delete it, as it was spreading fake information.” However, we were unable to find Amit Singh’s comment on the viral video, and it seems to be deleted.
‘Raam’ currency is not a legal tender, it’s a bearer bond introduced by GCWP in 2001. Its circulation is limited to some places in America and few European countries, particularly the Netherlands.
Therefore, NewsMeter concludes that the viral claim regarding an ‘Ayodhya’ currency is false.
(This story wa originally published by newsmeter.in, and repulished by english.varthabharati.in as part of Shakti Collective)
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Single higher education regulator bill tabled in LS; Oppn flags ‘centralisation,' JPC likely
New Delhi: A bill to set up a 13-member body to regulate institutions of higher education was introduced in the Lok Sabha on Monday.
Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan introduced the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill, which seeks to establish an overarching higher education commission along with three councils for regulation, accreditation, and ensuring academic standards for universities and higher education institutions in India.
Meanwhile, the move drew strong opposition, with members warning that it could weaken institutional autonomy and result in excessive centralisation of higher education in India.
The Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill, 2025, earlier known as the Higher Education Council of India (HECI) Bill, has been introduced in line with the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020.
The proposed legislation seeks to merge three existing regulatory bodies, the University Grants Commission (UGC), the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), and the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE), into a single unified body called the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan.
At present, the UGC regulates non-technical higher education institutions, the AICTE oversees technical education, and the NCTE governs teacher education in India.
Under the proposed framework, the new commission will function through three separate councils responsible for regulation, accreditation, and the maintenance of academic standards across universities and higher education institutions in the country.
According to the Bill, the present challenges faced by higher educational institutions due to the multiplicity of regulators having non-harmonised regulatory approval protocols will be done away with.
The higher education commission, which will be headed by a chairperson appointed by the President of India, will cover all central universities and colleges under it, institutes of national importance functioning under the administrative purview of the Ministry of Education, including IITs, NITs, IISc, IISERs, IIMs, and IIITs.
At present, IITs and IIMs are not regulated by the University Grants Commission (UGC).
Government to refer bill to JPC; Oppn slams it
The government has expressed its willingness to refer it to a joint committee after several members of the Lok Sabha expressed strong opposition to the Bill, stating that they were not given time to study its provisions.
Responding to the opposition, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju said the government intends to refer the Bill to a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) for detailed examination.
Congress Lok Sabha MP Manish Tewari warned that the Bill could result in “excessive centralisation” of higher education. He argued that the proposed law violates the constitutional division of legislative powers between the Union and the states.
According to him, the Bill goes beyond setting academic standards and intrudes into areas such as administration, affiliation, and the establishment and closure of university campuses. These matters, he said, fall under Entry 25 of the Concurrent List and Entry 32 of the State List, which cover the incorporation and regulation of state universities.
Tewari further stated that the Bill suffers from “excessive delegation of legislative power” to the proposed commission. He pointed out that crucial aspects such as accreditation frameworks, degree-granting powers, penalties, institutional autonomy, and even the supersession of institutions are left to be decided through rules, regulations, and executive directions. He argued that this amounts to a violation of established constitutional principles governing delegated legislation.
Under the Bill, the regulatory council will have the power to impose heavy penalties on higher education institutions for violating provisions of the Act or related rules. Penalties range from ₹10 lakh to ₹75 lakh for repeated violations, while establishing an institution without approval from the commission or the state government could attract a fine of up to ₹2 crore.
Concerns were also raised by members from southern states over the Hindi nomenclature of the Bill. N.K. Premachandran, an MP from the Revolutionary Socialist Party representing Kollam in Kerala, said even the name of the Bill was difficult to pronounce.
He pointed out that under Article 348 of the Constitution, the text of any Bill introduced in Parliament must be in English unless Parliament decides otherwise.
DMK MP T.M. Selvaganapathy also criticised the government for naming laws and schemes only in Hindi. He said the Constitution clearly mandates that the nomenclature of a Bill should be in English so that citizens across the country can understand its intent.
Congress MP S. Jothimani from Tamil Nadu’s Karur constituency described the Bill as another attempt to impose Hindi and termed it “an attack on federalism.”
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