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20 Rials Mohammad Rezā Pahlavī
| Issuer | Bank Melli Iran |
|---|---|
| Year | 1951-1953 |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Size | 131 × 69 mm |
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| Obverse description | Olive-green and multicolour note with an intaglio portrait of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi at centre-right over a fine guilloche underprint, flanked at both margins by vignettes of Achaemenid soldiers drawn from the Persepolis reliefs. The denomination in Persian script appears within an ornate rosette at the central panel, with two authorising signatures below and the bank title in Persian along the upper border. The Iranian solar Hijri date 1332 (SH) is inscribed at the bottom centre. |
|---|---|
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| Protection type | Watermark |
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| Comments |
Bank Melli Iran's 20 Rial note of this period was issued under the most politically turbulent years of Mohammad Mosaddegh's premiership — the nationalization of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company in 1951 had triggered a foreign exchange crisis severe enough that ordinary import transactions became difficult to clear. De La Rue's involvement is worth noting: British-printed currency for an Iranian government actively in conflict with British petroleum interests is one of those quiet ironies the banknote record preserves when political histories don't.
The Pick 55 series used a single watermark as its primary security feature, modest by De La Rue's own standards of the period. Mosaddegh was ousted in August 1953, and the note's issue window closes precisely there.