A numismatist is one of a breed. He is prepared to pay more than the face value of a coin or a note to acquire it for his collection. The reason? There’s more to a coin than just its intrinsic value. Often, there’s a story behind the coin that makes it interesting to a numismatist. At our Online Talk #YehPaisaBoltaHai, archaeologist and numismatist Anand Kothari tells us the stories that coins have been waiting to share - from the first trilingual coins issued in the world to the first commemorative coins, from the first token currency (think of it as non-digital cryptocurrency!) to the first demonetisation - many of these firsts credited to India. Come, hear more than the jingle-jangle they make in your pockets.

About the speaker:

Anand Kothari completed his Masters in Numismatics and Archaeology from Mumbai University, and is an avid coin collector specialising in ancient and Mughal era coins. He can decipher and read symbols and scripts on coins, and has been asked by IGNCA (Indira Gandhi National Centre for Arts), Ministry of Culture, New Delhi, to speak on "How to Retrieve Information from Coins" to Ph.D. students. He has also assisted and guided college students in sourcing coins for their journals and publications. He is a guest lecturer on Numismatics at Mumbai University and has been invited by schools to give lectures on the same.