1 Paisa - Khem Sawant Bhonsle III Sawantwadi

Sawantwadi — a small Maratha princely state tucked into the Konkan coast south of Goa — maintained its own coinage largely because Portuguese and later British commercial pressure made local monetary autonomy practically necessary for tax collection and market transactions. Khem Sawant Bhonsle III ruled during a period when the state was repeatedly caught between Maratha confederacy politics and the encroaching interests of the English East India Company. The nearly five-decade attribution window for this type reflects the difficulty of dating undated copper issues from minor Maratha states with any precision.