June 1, 1942 emergency issue of subsidiary notes of the denomination of cents five to tide over shortage of coins. The locally printed uniface notes have only serial number on back was demonetized on 1943 July 14th and ceased to be legal tender with effect 1943 September 30th.
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Front : Two Blue-gray Stamp-like images with King George VI facing
right at center. CEYLON on top of each stamp. Words TWO
CENTS with 2c just above on either side at bottom on left
side Stamp. Words THREE CENTS with 2c just above on
either side at bottom at bottom on right side Stamp. Total value
satha paha in Sinhala on left and Tamil on right of Stamps.
5c on the Four corners with THE GOVERNMENT OF
CEYLON centered on top Just below the words in 2 lines This
note is legal tender for the payment of a sum not exceeding Five
Rupees. Below 2 signatures H. J. Huxham &
C. H. Collins on right. Dated on left June 1, 1942 with
Text Commissioners of Currency on right below signatures.
Back : Blank except for Serial number stamped at top center.
The Notes are 3.4 x 2.3 inches, printed on one-side of paper with no water-mark. Unlike the January 1, 1942 notes printed on paper used by Teaa and Rubber Export Controller, these low denomination notes seem to have been printed on ordinary paper.
| Pick# | Date | Value | Mintage | Signatures |
| P042 | 1942-06-01 | 0.05 | 5040K | H. J. Huxham & C. H. Collins |
No information is available regarding the quantity of these notes perforated in the center to enable user to make payment of 2 cent or 5 cent when the need arose. A truly unique concept for a currency note. Roulletted 7 (7 dashes per 20 MM) it has 20 or 21 accross 2.3 inches (58MM).
The Stamp design was not used on actual CEYLON stamps which were Pictorial since 1935. The 3c design in Green was used on postage printed Postcards sold by the Post Office.
According to Sri Lanka Currency of Recent Times 1938-1985 by T. M. U. Sallay, published in 1986 Colombo:Central Bank of Sri Lanka Serial numbers 000001 to 720000 was issued with each of seven letter prefix A B C D E F G . He mentions 1771K of these notes (35.1%) remain unsurrendered to Central Bank. I find this hard to believe and I suspect a typo Notes F 480001 - F 720000 and G 480001 - F 720000 (480K) were probably never issued as they are not mentioned in the demontisation notice of 1943 July 14th.
All of these WWII fractional currency notes were only legal tender for payment of amounts less than Five Rupees. Maybe it was the lack of security features that made the Currency Board impose this limit.
Note American style date used only on these locally printed notes.
The front of note was scanned at 300 dpi and displayed at 150 dpi.
The blank reverse is scanned and posted at 75 dpi
This WWII note that circulated for just over one year in Ceylon is rare
particularly in uncirculated condition.
My father remembers needing to certify counted and sealed bags of these
notes to return to bank. I had a torn note he had kept. A pair of
notes was obtained in 2000 August from Raja Wickramasinhe
an author and collector in Colombo, Lanka. The perforated
was Unc (shown above) and the other VF. I obtained an unperforated AU
(shown above) on ebay in 2002 April.