The small text below the Ashoka Pillar capital — reading "भारतीय रिज़र्व बैंक" in fine print — was added as a subtle anti-counterfeiting measure during the mid-1980s revision of this series, distinguishing it from the immediately preceding issues. The Reserve Bank made several incremental modifications to the 100 Rupee notes throughout this period without formal series breaks, which creates persistent attribution headaches for collectors trying to pin down exact transition dates between varieties.
Pick 85A sits within a broader family of notes that circulated through one of India's more turbulent inflationary decades, and heavily worn examples vastly outnumber clean ones in the market.
The small text below the Ashoka Pillar capital — reading "भारतीय रिज़र्व बैंक" in fine print — was added as a subtle anti-counterfeiting measure during the mid-1980s revision of this series, distinguishing it from the immediately preceding issues. The Reserve Bank made several incremental modifications to the 100 Rupee notes throughout this period without formal series breaks, which creates persistent attribution headaches for collectors trying to pin down exact transition dates between varieties.
Pick 85A sits within a broader family of notes that circulated through one of India's more turbulent inflationary decades, and heavily worn examples vastly outnumber clean ones in the market.