Rupee - Ahmad Shah Bahadur Balwantnagar / Jhansi

Ahmad Shah Bahadur, the Mughal emperor whose name this rupee carries, was a largely ceremonial figurehead by the time these coins were struck — real power had fragmented among regional warlords and Maratha chiefs. Jhansi's use of his regnal name was a political convenience, lending Mughal legitimacy to a mint that answered to Maratha authority. The Balwantnagar mint designation places production at a fortified site in Bundelkhand, a contested region that changed hands repeatedly through the mid-eighteenth century.

Ahmad Shah Bahadur was deposed and blinded in 1754, which provides the hard terminus for this type.