Ceylon 1942 "Currency" ?

I found this in an old stamp album, so I'm claiming it as philatelic for the purposes of this post
Really I'm just wondering what it is? Its interesting.

Taken at face value (pun intended), I would assume it's a Five Rupee note.

Do you suspect otherwise?

Very interesting...never spied that before.
Look forward to replies.

Something Similar to US Postage Currency?

Very Interesting Item! A keeper!

Well yes, I suppose it is! Its just so unbanknotelike, I thought it might be out of the ordinary. But I'm not familiar with the regular Ceylon currency of that time. Maybe that's all it is.

This is actually a 5 Cent note - one-twentieth of a rupee. There was a severe shortage of small coins in India during WWII. This led to various interesting expedients, like the Cash Coupons of Bundi



which were made by appropriating superseded stamp dies, and overprinting them with small face values for use in place of coins. The Ceylon 5 cents would fit in value terms somewhere between the 3 Pies and 1 Anna Bundi items.

My guess is that, if this was necessary in India at the time, it would probably also have been necessary in Ceylon.

How can something exist, that no one on this forum
has seen before?
That in itself is amazing...well done Stampgal

Rod, they only haven't seen it because its not a stamp...

As I thought Stampgal, they are "stamps"

...and well done Tony Macg

Emergency issue of Ceylon to relieve a shortage of coins.

There exists a 5 cent note of the Government of Ceylon dated 1 June, 1942 which depicts side by side a 2 and a 3
cent stamp. In case of necessity it was permitted to cut the note into two pieces valued.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF STAMPS USED ON BANK NOTES
Arnold Keller and John Sandrock

Typical - someone else got there whilst I was typing. Ok it took nearly an hour for me to finish my post, but I had to put the kids to bed in the middle of it!
Below is quote from the website of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka's Currency Museum.

"Notes issued by the Board of Commissioners of Currency
(Under Government of Ceylon) (1884 – 1950)
The Board of Commissioners consisted of

The Treasurer

Colonial Secretary

Auditor General


Subsidiary Currency Notes
Under the provisions of the Emergency Powers Acts. 1939 and 1940 the Board of Currency was authorized to issue denominations below one rupee to meet the shortage of coins.

Subsidiary Notes issued by the Board of Commissioners
05 Cents
10 Cents
25 Cents
50 Cents
1 Rupee

Of these notes, the 5 cents carried imprints of postage stamps of 2 cents and 3 cents.
Other Notes issued by the Board of Commissioners
One Rupee
Two Rupees
Five Rupees
Ten Rupees
Fifty Rupees
Hundred Rupees
Five hundred Rupees
Thousand Rupees
Ten thousand Rupees

Rs. 10,000 currency note was used only for inter bank transactions."

Great information Stampgal,
well researched.
To really give some credibility to philately
we need to source the printer.
If typography by say De La Rue, you have a worthy contender :)

Interesting, indeed.

That is not an imprint of a Ceylon postage or revenue stamp that I'm familiar with. Must be postal stationery?

Why does it say that it is not valid for amounts exceeding 5R? Does that mean that you couldn't aggregate a pocketful of these 5c notes to pay a 10R bar tab?

Rod, this doesn't look quite "classy" enough to be De La Rue.

My 2d.

Going by the nature of the requirement, you
would expect these to have been produced in a hurry.
Possibly the printer adapted a design that was previously
an essay.
I don't recall seeing that shape before.
Not sure on the 5R limit, these were extensively forged.
We shall have to place in the memory bank, and let it
resurface when a Ceylon expert joins the forum :)

The design seems to basically match H&G #70, so it appears to originate from postal stationery.

Alas. No Higgins and Gage in my Library.

Just a few more details from the note itself. The size is just under 9cm X 6cm. The paper is of a type and weight similar to postage stamps, I would say. the printing is not good quality. The scan pretty much reflects the quality of the stamp images. Much worse than you would expect of a stamp of that time/place (in my unexpert opinion).
On the reverse is a number "E 015220", which looks to have been stamped on, probably a serial number?
Glad to get you all scratching your heads!