If, however, the stock of rupees in the reserves is running low (for a considerable quantity of rupees must always be kept there in order to ensure the ready convertibility of the notes in terms of rupees), and more Council Bills are sold in London than can be conveniently cashed in Calcutta in the above ways, more rupees must be issued from the Mint. The silver out of which they are minted is purchased in England out of the proceeds of selling the additional Council Bills, and the surplus due to the fact that rupees are worth more than the silver they contain, is credited to the Gold Standard Reserve. According to the present practice the process in these circumstances also is, therefore, automatic, and the amount of new rupees put into circulation does not depend on the arbitrary action of the Secretary of State in selling or withholding Council Bills. If he did not sell bills, sovereigns would be sent to India, new rupees would have to be coined to meet the obligation under which the Government of India has placed itself of giving rupees in exchange for sovereigns on demand, and a great part of the sovereigns would have to be credited in some form or other to the Gold Standard Reserve or shipped back to England again to pay for the silver. It is true that, if a different practice were adopted (a practice which was adopted in part in 1907), and if the profits on the coinage of rupees, instead of being credited to the Gold Standard Reserve, were turned into rupees and spent by the Government in India on goods and services (whether for capital or any other purpose), more rupees would be in circulation for the time being than would have been the case otherwise. But even in this case the effect on the volume of circulation must be temporary, so long as the provisions for the maintenance of the rupee at 1s. 4d. are in operation. For this additional issue of rupees would, eventually, have the effect of delaying additional demands for coinage in the future or of precipitating an occasion for the withdrawal of rupees from circulation. While, therefore, it is to a certain extent within the power of Government (though not at present according to their usual practice) to urge a certain number of rupees into circulation _more rapidly_ than is necessary, they cannot _permanently_ increase the circulation without depreciating its gold value, that is, they cannot permanently increase the circulation beyond what it would otherwise be and at the same time maintain the rupee at 1s. 4d. It may be added that a release of rupees from any other reserve, or even a temporary increase in the amount of capital funds annually raised by Government abroad for use in India, would have a similar effect to the release of rupees from the Gold Standard Reserve. But, however all this might be, at present the Government of India do _not_, in fact, exert such discretionary powers as they possess for affecting, even temporarily, the volume of circulation.