2 Annas - Victoria Off Metal Strike

The 1862 coinage reform was a landmark administrative exercise — the British Indian government standardized its fractional silver across three presidency mints simultaneously, with Calcutta, Bombay, and Madras all striking to unified specifications for the first time. Off-metal proofs in gold from this series were produced almost exclusively for presentation and were never intended to leave official hands. Prid#484 places this among a small suite of gold strikings from the reform issue.

Survivors at this weight point to Calcutta as the most probable source, though attribution between mints on these proof strikings remains contested among specialists.