India Post diversifies to cope with changing times
| Prashanth Vijayakumar |
Chennai: With major postal services in the world phasing out door-to-door delivery of mail, the top brass of the postal department has said the future of India Post lay with parcel delivery services.
"Australia's postal service, for example, has more parcel deliveries than mail. In the same manner, if our e-commerce picks up, most of the people will make use of India Post (IP) since we are the only players to have the widest possible network, and IP will still have a chance to stay alive," said Mervin Alexander, post master general, Chennai circle.
The department is, however, constantly engaging with people through its philatelic activities and special initiatives, like 'My Stamp', of which it has sold over 5,000 models. "We are aware of the fact that letters will start to dwindle in the coming decades. However, we have already started to diversify our services. We are going to introduce core banking very soon," said Mervin Alexander.
The philatelic activities of the department continue to find takers. "Stamp collection will help one develop patience and skill, those are the major benefits. The collection of stamps and putting them together needs a lot of skill; there is also great scope for learning about other countries," said Dr S.S. Sukumar, former state president, Indian Medical Association.
The department personnel claim that as many as 60 lakh letters and greeting cards are delivered during New Year and Christmas.
"I still preserve my father's letters which become precious after some years. The youth, these days, do not know what they are missing because they were never in that era. My brother has written long letters to us, scolding us; it brings back a fragment of memory when one re-reads it today.
E-mail pinging does not give the feel of a handwritten letter. We have lost our writing and reading habit over a period of time," said Dr Sujatha Priya, faculty of English at Anna University in Chennai.
Several post officesin state of acute disrepair
Prashanth Vijayakumar | DC
Chennai: Several major post offices in the city are on the verge of caving in due to the postal department's engineering wing adopting a lackadiasical approach to renovation. A series of wall collapses at the Park and Egmore post offices has had postal staff fear that more such could occur.
Chetpet post office staff aver that their building will be next in line as the cracks in the roofs are widening. Their repeated pleas to improve infrastructure have been disregarded. "Many post offices do not have even basic toilet facilities. We have brought this to the higher officials' attention innumerable times, but in vain," complained a staff member of the Chetpet postal circle.
Restoration work has begun at the Park post office, where the mishap occurred when no one was present, but members of the Postal Union fear for their colleagues in other post offices.
Chetpet post office that needs urgent renovation.
Even the historic General Post Office (GPO) complex, near Parry's Corner, constructed in 1884 and which is under Schedule One of the Heritage category, is awaiting renovation. "Fire is reported in many heritage buildings these days.
We should be more careful and start GPO's restoration as soon as possible. There is no point in delaying the process," said Dr S. Suresh, state convener, Indian National Trust for Art and Culture Heritage.
Senior postal administrative officials said that all necessary measures were being taken in this regard which would allay the fears of their employees over dilapidated buildings. "Work is going on in some places: soon we will cover all the problematic regions," said a senior India post official.
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