RBI Monetary Museum

The RBI Monetary Museum, opened in 2004 in the Reserve Bank of India's Amar Building on Sir P. M. Road, is a small, free and unexpectedly absorbing institution that tells the story of money on the subcontinent across some 2,600 years. Its galleries begin with the punch-marked silver karshapanas of the sixth century BC, among the earliest coinage anywhere, and move through the coins of the Indo-Greeks, the Kushans, the Guptas, the Delhi Sultanate and the Mughal mohurs, before reaching the trade coinage of the European companies, the rupee of British India and the currency of the independent republic. Displays cover paper money from the earliest private bank notes of the eighteenth century onwards, the mechanics of minting and printing, security features and forgery, hundis and other indigenous credit instruments, and gold bars and bullion. Interactive panels and short films explain how monetary policy works and what a central bank does, which makes the museum genuinely useful for older children and students as well as collectors. The setting, in the heart of the Fort financial district a few minutes from Horniman Circle and the Bombay Stock Exchange, is fitting, and the visit takes about an hour. Security procedures apply on entry, with bags screened and photography restricted inside the galleries. As one of the few free museums in South Mumbai, it is an easy addition to any walk through the colonial banking quarter.