20 Rials - Mohammad Rezā Pahlavī Pahlavi Rule

This issue belongs to the 2535 Imperial Calendar series, struck in 1976 as part of Iran's controversial switch from the Islamic Hijri calendar to one counting from the founding of the Persian Empire — a nationalist project personally championed by Mohammad Reza Shah as part of his broader program to anchor Iranian identity in pre-Islamic antiquity rather than religious tradition. The calendar change provoked significant clerical opposition, and coins bearing the Imperial year dating were withdrawn from emphasis within just three years as the revolution gathered force.