The Indian Rupee (INR) is the official currency and monetary unit of the Republic of India, regulated and issued solely by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), which is the country's central bank. The name originates from the Sanskrit word rūpya, meaning "wrought silver." The modern lineage of the currency is traced back to the silver coin "Rupiya" issued by Sher Shah Suri between 1540–1545. The rupee was made uniform by law in 1835 under the British East India Company.
After India's independence in 1947, the country retained the rupee, and the system was decimalized on April 1, 1957, under the 1955 Indian Coinage (Amendment) Act, dividing one rupee into 100 paise, replacing the earlier system of 16 annas. The RBI, established under the Reserve Bank of India Act, 1934, controls the issue and supply of the currency. The official symbol, ₹, was adopted in 2010, combining the Devanagari letter र (ra) and the Latin letter R.
The rupee's value is determined in a floating exchange rate system, most commonly measured against the US dollar as the USD/INR exchange rate. A significant recent change is the introduction of the International Trade Settlement Mechanism in the Indian Rupee by the RBI in July 2022. This mechanism allows for the invoicing and settlement of exports and imports in INR through Special Rupee Vostro Accounts opened by foreign banks in India, aiming to reduce dependence on the US dollar for international trade. Furthermore, the RBI launched the Digital Rupee (e₹), a Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC), with the retail version (e₹-R) introduced on December 1, 2022. In terms of physical currency, the ₹1,000 notes were withdrawn during the 2016 demonetization, and the ₹2,000 notes have also since been withdrawn.