Indian Currency and Finance

by John Maynard Keynes

CHAPTER V

COUNCIL BILLS AND REMITTANCE

1. Remittance by means of what are termed Council Bills is a feature peculiar to the Indian system, and is not, so far as I know, to be paralleled elsewhere. It arises partly from the historical circumstance that the Government of India is the successor of a trading company, partly from the necessity under which the Government lies of making very large annual remittances to England.

2. The Home Charges, that is, the payments which the Government of India must make in England, for interest on debt, pensions, payments to the War Office, Government stores (not chargeable to capital), etc., amount to £19,000,000 or £20,000,000 annually. But the amount which it is necessary to remit, apart from extraordinary remittances to be dealt with later, is usually less than this; for the amount of new capital raised by Government in England usually exceeds their capital expenditure in this country on repayments and on railway materials, etc. Thus the amount which it is necessary to remit to England annually is from £15,000,000 to £18,000,000. Rupees to this amount, being part of the revenue from taxation, etc., accumulate in the Indian Treasuries. This value is remitted to England by selling for sterling in London bills which can be cashed in rupees in Calcutta. Thus the Government of India pays out rupees in Calcutta when the bills are presented, and the Secretary of State’s balances at the Bank of England are swelled by a corresponding amount.

The Government is, therefore, one of the largest dealers in foreign exchange, and does for itself business, which Colonial Governments, for example, who have a certain amount of similar transactions to carry through (though on a far smaller scale), would do through a bank. But while the Government saves for itself the commission which it would otherwise have to pay to a bank, it is not, in any real sense, a competitor with the banks for business. In the first place, it sells exchange, save in exceptional circumstances, in one direction only. And in the second place, the Secretary of State’s method of selling exchange results in his dealing exclusively with the Exchange Banks and financial houses, and not directly with the trading public. The Secretary of State is in effect the ultimate source of supply for bills on India, and the banks, after securing what private bills are available, even up their demands for remittance to India by buying bills from him,—provided he is selling them at a rate which makes this form of remittance cheaper than the alternative one of sending sovereigns. The method by which these bills are sold is as follows.

3. The bills are offered in London for tender at the Bank of England every Wednesday morning, the Secretary of State for India in Council (or, for short, the India Council, whence the name Council Bills) having previously announced the amount (70 lakhs, say) for which tenders are invited. There is a reserve price (not published) below which he will not sell, but this reserve price is seldom operative.[51] The tenders name the amount tendered for and the number of pence per rupee which is offered. The total amount of 70 lakhs is then allotted to the highest bidders, the allotment at the minimum rate accepted being proportionate to the amount applied for at that rate.

If the demand is large and the minimum rate of allotment high (say 1s. 4³/₃₂d.), the amount offered for tender the following week (which is announced at the same time as the result of the previous allotment) is likely to be increased. In the interval between the allotments on successive Wednesdays, the Secretary of State is usually willing to sell what are known as “specials” at a rate ¹/₃₂d. higher than the highest rate of allotment on the preceding Wednesday.

4. It should be added that cash must be paid for the bills in London as soon as they are allotted; but, on account of the time taken by the mail, they cannot be changed into rupees at Calcutta for about a fortnight. A fortnight’s interest is therefore lost, and it is worth paying extra to obtain what are called “telegraphic transfers,” by means of which rupees can be obtained at Calcutta almost as soon as the sovereigns are paid into the Secretary of State’s account at the Bank of England.

The Secretary of State, therefore, is usually willing to sell telegraphic transfers at a rate ¹/₃₂d. per rupee higher than the rate for bills.[52] If the purchaser chooses transfers, the effect to him is that he gets his rupees a fortnight earlier in India and pays for this privilege a sum equal to 5 per cent on the money for a fortnight. The question, whether it is worth the purchaser’s while to pay this extra sum, chiefly depends upon the Indian bank rate, because this governs the amount of interest which can be gained by having the money immediately available in India. It may happen, of course, that a particular bank may have a special urgency for funds in India, or that the rate for fortnightly loans does not closely agree with the bank rate. Generally speaking, however, if the purchaser can lend money out at no higher rate than 3 per cent in India, he will certainly prefer bills; but if he can lend at 7 per cent in India, it will be more profitable for him to buy transfers.