On a wrong note

While philately might look like a dying art, numismatists (people who collect coins) are finding new ways to keep the hobby alive. One of the unique practices among numismatists is the collection coins or notes with errors in them. Shyju K. Antony is one such numismatist.

Shyju has a wide variety of coins and notes which has printing errors in them. It also includes the latest notes in circulation after demonetisation. Shyju narrates the incident that led to his ‘error note’ collection: “Years ago, when I was standing in queue at the Ernakulam railway station, I saw a railway employee at the counter refusing to accept a note which had faded print at one end, despite it having the water mark and security thread. I found it interesting and exchanged another note with him. After I realised that such notes are in circulation, I started collecting them.”

Shyju, who is currently working with the Little Flower Hospital & Research Centre, started his note collection with a series of ‘Gandhi-less’ notes. “I gathered notes without the Gandhi image and they ranged from Rs 10 to the latest Rs 500 note. I also have a Rs 500 note without the Dandi march visual.” Shyju has an interesting quip, “I would like to believe that since these notes are used for purposes sans morals, Gandhi himself must have decided to boycott the notes.” Shyju had earlier conducted an exhibition with this concept and named it ‘Call back Gandhi’.

Shyju also has another set which he has named ‘Money for Values’. “The number of such notes will be the date of birth of those who have donated their organs. Some also has the dates on which they donated the organ.”

Shyju currently has nearly 300 notes with errors and more than 60 notes sans Gandhi. Apart these, he also has a collection of Travancore coins and medical related stamps. “But my focus is mostly on notes with printing mistakes. Because, the Reserve Bank is sending out notes after a lot of scrutiny. And when they come across errors, those notes are destroyed and replaced. That is the habit but even after that when so many notes with errors are coming into circulation, that is a huge fault on the bank’s side. And that provides the thrill.”