Tola

Indian subcontinentTraditional unit (still used in some regions)

180 grains, about 11.6638 g. The traditional South Asian unit for gold and silver, still the basis of gold prices in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.

1 tola = 0.0116638038 kilograms (exactly).

About the tola

Tola comes from a Sanskrit word for weighing, and the unit was traditionally the weight of 100 ratti seeds, the red-and-black seeds of the rosary pea used by Indian goldsmiths. Its weight differed from place to place. Akbar's coins were close to a tola, and Sher Shah Suri's rupee was about one percent lighter than the later British tola.

In 1833 Regulation VII of the British government in India fixed it at 180 troy grains, or about 11.6638 g, exactly three eighths of a troy ounce. The earlier Bengal sicca standard, one Murshidabad rupee, was about 179.67 grains, so this was more tidying up than change. A tola divided into 12 masha of 8 ratti each, and 80 tolas made a seer. Zanzibar's tola was lighter, around 11.34 g. India officially dropped it in 1956, yet gold is still sold by the tola, notably as 10-tola bars, across India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and the Gulf.

Sources: Wikipedia: Tola (unit); Wikipedia: Seer (unit)

Tola conversion chart

1 tola expressed in every other weight & mass unit:

More Indian subcontinent units

• seer (weight & mass)
• maund (weight & mass)
• guntha (area)
• cent (India) (area)
• marla (area)
• kanal (area)
• ghati (time)
• muhurta (time)
• prahar (time)
• lakh (counting & quantity)
• crore (counting & quantity)
• arab (Indian) (counting & quantity)
• kharab (Indian) (counting & quantity)

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