Vibhuti Agarwal reports on the Wall Street Journal’s India Real Time blog that a new symbol has been chosen to represent the Indian Rupee. In March 2009, the Indian Finance Ministry launched a contest to create a globally-recognized symbol for the country’s currency, alongside those of the Dollar ($), Euro (€), Yen (¥), and Pound (£).

In June, the government shortlisted five designs from a symbol design contest bearing prize money of 250,000 rupees. Finally, on Thursday, the decision was made and the winner revealed with the Cabinet giving its nod to a representation for the Indian currency proposed by D. Udaya Kumar, a post-graduate student from the country’s premier Indian Institute of Technology.

The new symbol contains the Devanagari ‘Ra’ and the Roman capital ‘R’ without its upright leg. It’s hard to describe. It also looks like backward “c” suspended on a backslash with some railway tracks running through it. That help?

“With this, the Indian currency has arrived on the international platform,” Ambika Soni, India’s information and broadcasting minister, said at a press conference Thursday.