10 Rupees - Mahendra Bir Bikram FAO

Issued as part of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization's coin program, which ran through the late 1960s and 1970s and recruited dozens of nations to mint commemorative pieces promoting agricultural development. Nepal's participation came during the reign of King Mahendra Bir Bikram, whose government had been steering a course of calculated non-alignment since his 1960 royal coup dissolved the elected parliament and banned political parties. The FAO program gave smaller issuing authorities a low-cost route to international numismatic visibility — most participating nations struck modest mintages aimed squarely at collector markets rather than circulation.