one quarter anna india 1939

Hi, everyone, a strange and possibly hard to take question/enquiry for the purists among you, my sincere apologies. I am also a very beginner in numismatics. A friend of mine just gave me a defaced coin that she removed from a vintage coral necklace, it is presumably of some copper mix and a "one quarter anna india of 1939 with first head and of Calcutta mint (eg without the top dot on the value face). What can I do with it ? It has 2 holes in its centre like a button. Is it worth anything ? My friend thought of melting it and using it as copper for her jewellery making but I do not know the purity of its copper metal. Is it an alloy of some kind or not ? Would it be further sacrilege to melt it now that it has been defaced or does that make it more interesting/valuable ?

Hello and welcome!

We usually ask for photos of coins when evaluating them, but from what you say it sounds like your coin, which was already quite a common coin to begin with, by being holed has lost pretty much all its numismatic value. So I'd say go ahead and melt it.

Here it is on Numista; you can see that it's actually bronze, to answer your other question:
https://en.numista.com/catalogue/pieces1618.html