World Postal Day happens each year on October 9, commemorating the date
for the establishment of Universal Postal Union (UPU) in 1874 in Bern, Switzerland. The UPU was the start of
global communication revolution, allowing people could write to others all over
the world. October 9th was first declared World Postal Day at the 1969 UPU
Congress in Tokyo, Japan. Since then, World
Post Day has been celebrated all over the world to highlight the importance of
the postal services.
The Postal Services is under the Department of Posts, which
is part of the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology of the Govt of India.
The apex body of the department is the Postal Service Board, consisting of a
chair and six members. The six board members govern personnel, operations,
technology, Postal Life Insurance, Human Resource Development (HRD) and
planning. The joint secretary and financial adviser is also a permanent
invitee.
India has been divided into 22 postal circles, each
circle headed by a chief Postmaster General. Each circle is divided into
regions, headed by a Postmaster General and comprising field units known as
divisions (headed by SSPOs and SPOs). These divisions are further divided into
sub divisions, headed by ASPs and IPOs. Other functional units (such as circle
stamp depots, postal store depots and mail motor service) may exist in the
circles and regions. In addition to the 22 circles, there is a
base circle to provide postal services to the Armed Forces of India. The base
circle is headed by a Director General, Army Postal Service (with a rank of Major General).
The highest Post Office in the world is Hikkim, Himachal Pradesh, India at a height of
15,500 ft (4700m) (postal code-172114).
The first adhesive postage stamp in Asia were issued
in the Indian district of Scinde in July 1852 by Bartle Frere chief
Commissioner of the region. Frere was an admirer of Rowland Hill, the English
postal reformer who had introduced the Penny Post. The Scinde stamps became
known as “Scinde
Dawks”,
‘Dawk’ is the Anglicized spelling of the Hindustani word Dak or (‘post’). These
stamps with a value of ½ anna, were in use until june 1866. The first all India
stamps were issued on 01 October 1854.
Rakesh Swarnkar
Army Postal Service Corps
