Q8NRI.com

On a day when India finally got a symbol for the Rupee and joined a select club of countries whose currencies have an unique identity, CNN-IBN spoke to D Udaya Kumar, a postgraduate student of the Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay, who had designed the symbol.

CNN-IBN: Now that the symbol that you drew has been selected as the symbol that represents Indian Rupee, it must be a proud moment for you?

D Udaya Kumar: Certainly. I am really excited and thrilled. I can’t find words to express my happiness.

CNN-IBN: Can you please explain to what it (the symbol) actually means?

D Udaya Kumar: I have given a lot of thought to this design. It is basically based on the letter ‘ra’ in Devnagri script. In that, I have just added a strikethrough line to represent Indian flag. And since I have incorporated the Devnagri script, it represents the Indianness of it because the top-line is quite unique and is not found in any other script. I have also tried to incorporate the Roman script ‘R’ within it for it to have an international appeal.

CNN-IBN: It is not the first time that you have designed something like this. Your PhD also contained a lot of designs. What are your future plans? Where are you headed to now?

D Udaya Kumar: I always wanted to be a teacher. Now that I have been selected as an assistant professor at Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Guwahati, it is a great opportunity for me.

CNN-IBN: Few days back, we saw how a 22-year-old (Dr Tathagat Tulsi) became the youngest professor to join IIT-Bombay. You too are from the IIT. Is it the institution that pushes you to do these things?

D Udaya Kumar: Certainly. The environment here definitely gives us an advantage. It inspires one a lot when one sees his friends working hard and doing a great job. One is inspired to follow them, do a lot of work and achieve something. So, IIT-Bombay has immensely helped me, inspired me a lot and supported me with all my designs.

CNN-IBN: How significant is this new symbol for Indian rupee as well as Indian economy, from your perspective?

D Udaya Kumar: I think it is very much important that the Indian currency has a symbol because everywhere we see Dollar signs, Euro signs and Pound signs. Now that we also have a symbol, it would be seen all over the world.

CNN-IBN: You were one of the five persons whose symbols were shortlisted. You also got an opportunity to interact with them. How was that experience?

D Udaya Kumar: When five of us finalists were called to Delhi to make presentations, I got to share my design as well as see their designs. All the designs were really great and had their own uniqueness in them. It also made me look at my design with a different perspective. And though there were some commonalities between our designs; each one of our designs were excellent.

George Koshy , CNN-IBN
Pic via Indian Express