Prime Minister Narendra Modi inquired with the RBI officials about the idea of  manufacturing the paper and ink used for currency notes. The Prime Minister, who attended the financial conclave organized by the central government to celebrate its 80yrs of existence on Thursday, opined that Gandhi fought for swadeshi, but  printing his picture on an imported paper and ink is not good.

Modi said “Make in India should start from here and I am confident that we can soon start printing currency with our own paper and ink”.

RBI deputy governor SS Mundra said that a currency paper manufacturing factory work is almost nearing its completion. He expressed his confidence to start printing currency with own paper and ink.

Out of the 15 billion pieces that are currently used for currency printing annually, 12 billion are completely made with imported paper.

Taking ink into the picture, is imported from a Swiss company SICPA  and printing machines from Japan and Switzerland. 

The import cost of paper, ink and printing machines account for about 80% of the cost of printing the notes in our country.

By the end of march 2014, the total value of bank notes in circulation amounting to Rs. 12,82,900 crores registering an increase of 10.1%  compared to its last year. In the same period, the volume of bank notes increased to 77 billion pieces, an increase of 5.2%.

RBI already has announced about its withdrawal of the currency issued before 2005, to avoid the risk from the multiple series of bank notes. As per the request of government, RBI is doing it gradually.