Sri Lanka mulls to use Indian currency for conducting local transactions in the Country

NEW DELHI: Recently, the Sri Lankan Foreign Minister, Ali Sabry, said that Colombo is lookingintothepossibilityofusingthe Indian Rupee for local transactions, and this move will allow tourists and otherpeopletodirectlyusetheIndian currency and avoid the hassle of multiplecurrencyconversion.

Accepting the Indian Rupee will prove beneficial for the Island nation as the trade imbalance between the two countries is in favour of India. Sabry said, “We need more Indian currency, so more Indian people coming here and spending Indian currency is goodforus.”

According to official figures, the bilateral trade between the two nations stood at 5.45 billion USD in 2021. Sri Lanka imports plenty of items from India which include food, medicine, pharmaceuticals, automobiles, construction materials,chemicalsandfertilizers.

The Foreign Secretary, Vinay Mohan Kwatra, on July 21, 2023, said that “tourism flow from India has been the consistent contributor to the economic and foreign exchange inflows into Sri Lanka.