By Admin 
A special 20 year old tradition has now ended in Indian Railways. Railways will no longer give gold plated silver coins as farewell gifts to its retiring employees and officers. This decision has been implemented with immediate effect and the Railway Board issued its official order on 28 January 2026.
Used to get 20 gram silver coins on retirement
This tradition was going on since March 2006, in which gold plated silver coins weighing about 20 grams were given on retirement. This coin was a symbol of respect and remembrance of service to the employees. Thousands of railway employees have received such coins in the last 20 years.
Tradition stopped due to scam in Bhopal division
The biggest reason for stopping this tradition is the big scam of Bhopal Mandal. Investigation revealed that an order of 3,640 coins was placed in Bhopal of West Central Railway in 2023 from an Indore company (M/s Viable Diamonds). Of these, 3,631 coins were supplied, but lab tests revealed that these coins were actually made of copper and the silver content in them was only 0.23 percent. The remaining part was copper, whereas according to the rules it should have been 99.9% pure silver.
The fraud was caught when some retired employees tried to sell these coins at rising silver prices, but the jewelers told them that they were fake. This caused a big shock to the employees because the coin which was a symbol of respect started looking like an insult. Railways lodged an FIR against the supplier company in Bhopal, started the process of blacklisting it and confiscated the remaining coins. It is estimated that there will be fraud of about Rs 2,200-2,500 in each coin, due to which the total scam can be in crores.
What will happen to the existing stock coins?
Principal Executive Director of Railway Board, Renu Sharma, has clearly written in the order issued on 28 January 2026 that ‘Discontinuation of practice of presenting Gold plated Silver Medals to retiring Railway officials’ i.e. the practice of giving Gold plated Silver Medals to retiring Railway officials is stopped. This order is applicable to all zones, production units and training institutes. The existing stock coins will now be used for other purposes. This decision will also be applicable to the employees retiring on 31 January 2026, that is, now they will not get this coin.