1/2 Rupee - In the name of Guangxu, 1875-1908 'Szechuan Rupee', silver, two obverses

Tibet began striking its own rupee-weight coins around 1902–1904 specifically to displace the Indian Rupee — and particularly the Sichuan-minted Chinese trade rupees — that had saturated Tibetan markets following the expansion of cross-Himalayan commerce. The "Szechuan Rupee" type borrowed its authority from the Guangxu reign title while being struck in Lhasa, a deliberate political hedge that invoked Qing legitimacy without submitting to Qing mint control.

The two-obverse variety — no reverse in the conventional sense — remains incompletely explained in the literature. Whether a minting error, a deliberate die pairing, or a product of the chaotic conditions at the Lhasa mint during the 1904–1912 period is unresolved.