"Exploring India Post: A Journey Through Time, Stamps, and Stories

 

Have you seen the movie Border

in your childhood?

There is a song in it that makes me

emotional even today.

This song is so special that

just by watching this scene,

its tune will start playing in your mind.

But today's blog is not about

these soldiers,

today's blog is about messages.

Messages come, but how?

Because of this one number,

that is the PIN code.

A few days ago I read a news

that every year India spends

more than 20 thousand crores

to maintain India Post.

What's more, India Post has become

India's biggest loss-making PSU,

meaning more losses

than Air India and BSNL.

So this question came to my mind

why does India need a post?

Is this snail mail relevant

in the age of email?

And what difference does it make to us?

Let us know in today's blog.

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like you and me living in the city.

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Chapter 1: The story of the 

letter.

It was the year 1766 when the British

had to communicate with their colonies

in England.

They had to send items

and no such system existed here.

So they started company mail

for their convenience.

Post Office Act was made in 1837.

This network came under the Crown

in 1854.

And the India Post Office Act

made in 1898 used to govern

our post till date.

Now in 2023, after 125 years,

a new Act has been made about which

discussion and debates are going on

in the Parliament.

By the time the British left in 1947,

they had left some 23,000 post offices

in all the cities.

But after that, till date,

a network of 1,55,000 post offices

has been formed in the entire country,

out of which 90% are in villages

and remote areas.

Like in Spiti.

This is Hikkim Post Office,

the highest post office in the world

at an altitude of 15,000 feet.

The world's only floating post office

is in Dal Lake, Srinagar.

You will not believe it

but not only in India,

we also have a post office in Antarctica

where research material is handled.

India Post is

the world's largest postal network

with more than 5 lakh employees.

You may have never sent a letter

in your life,

there may not be anyone in your life

who writes a love letter to you,

but wait,

you must have definitely used this number, 

XXXXXX

this is the pin code.

You have to enter this while

shopping online or ordering food.

But what does it mean?

The full form of PIN code is

the Postal Index Number.

Any PIN code has six digits.

In this, numbers 1-8 are

for geographical regions,

and 9 for Army Postal Service.

The second digit indicates the sub-region.

That is, by combining the first 2 digits,

it is known to which area of the country

the letter is to be sent.

For example,

if 70 is written in this pin code,

then the postcard is going to West Bengal.

The third digit is for the district

where the letters are sorted out.

The last three digits indicate

which post office the letters

will be addressed to.

Here, Pin Code is the own GPS

for lakhs of post offices in India,

it is a navigation system

by which they deliver the letters

from one corner of the country to another.

But who developed this PIN code?

The British did, right?

Wrong.

Chapter 2: The Story of Pin 

Code.

This is Shriram Bhikaji Welankar

who is the unsung hero of India.

Let me tell you one interesting thing

about him, that he was a Sanskrit poet.

He composed Vilom Kavyas which

can be read both forwards and backwards,

and they have different meanings.

For example, if read in forward direction,

this Vilom poem is about Ram,

and if read the opposite way,

it is about Shri Krishna.

How cool, right?

But his next work is even cooler.

His father was a primary school teacher

in Konkan.

But Welankar wanted to become an IAS.

But the India of his time

was not the India of today.

This is from 1938

when out of 150 IAS officers,

only three Indian officers were selected

and all the remaining officers

were British.

Despite standing first

in the IAS written exam,

Welankar failed in the colonization exam.

But he did not give up.

He started studying and preparing

for competitive exams.

By 1944, he joined India Post.

This was a very challenging time.

As we mentioned before

there were only 23,000 post offices in India

Because the work of the post

was not about communication in India,

it was to keep the British

connected with England.

So wherever there was a British

there was a post office,

this system used to be there.

It took 25 years after independence

for Indian Post to become Indianised.

And when did that happen?

After suffering a major shock.

Bangladesh Liberation War

took place in 1971.

India defeated Pakistan in this war

but there were big problems

in reaching important communications

to our soldiers.

At that time we realized that

there is no uniform way of

writing addresses across India,

there is no single standard.

Many people cannot read and write,

and the languages are so different

that if someone has written

the address in Kannada

and has to deliver it in Rajasthan,

then how will the postman

read the address?

Even if they could read the address,

many people with the same name lived

in the same village.

How to solve this problem?

Velenkar used the formula of elimination.

If it is difficult to find a needle

in a haystack,

then make the haystack smaller.

From this idea,

the PIN code was born in 1972,

the logic of which is that people

can remember only one simple number

so that the letter at least reaches

the right post office.

The postman got the letters in

the right post office in the right region,

in the right district,

after which they could go

and deliver them on the ground.

On 15th August 1972, this PIN code system

came into effect throughout India.

What difference does the PIN code make?

There are 4 main points.

Efficiency increased.

The delivery time reduced to one-tenth.

It became possible to reach every corner

of the country.

The chances of the wrong letter falling

into the wrong hands were reduced.

And most importantly,

people got a new way of writing addresses.

This is something that we take

for granted today.

Today every address is incomplete

without a PIN.

Even companies like Amazon

will not give you delivery

without entering the PIN code.

This is proof of how effective

this Walenkar formula is,

which works even after 50 years.

Chapter 3: Status of 

today's  Post.

The post was useful yesterday.

This does not mean that we should

depend on its past usefulness.

Because if we had stopped innovating

in 1971 itself,

and let things continue as they were,

we would not be here today.

Not only about India Post

but also about other delivery services.

At the beginning of the blog,

we said that India Post is

the biggest loss-making PSU in India.

But why?

When Post started,

people did not even have phones,

leave aside Amazon, Zepto, and FedEx.

The only means of communication was post.

But today there is Email,

there is social media,

due to which the volume of posts

has reduced, competition has increased,

and private players have entered

the courier industry.

You won't believe it,

but 90% of the money the post earns

is spent on paying salaries to employees.

On top of that,

there are operational costs and pensions

for retired employees.

By doing this the post's losses

increase year after year.

Here you can see the post's revenue

in the green line,

and their expenses in the red line.

The difference between them is written

in numbers.

Where 10 years ago,

we were making losses of ₹5,000 crore,

today the loss figure

has reached ₹20,000 crore.

Who has to pay these losses?

Common people like you and me

because this money comes from our taxes.

After seeing these numbers,

you may think why not just close the post?

But let me tell you a small story.

This year we collected mango seeds

from which we planted trees

and donated these trees to poor farmers.

But the courier company was keeping

mango seeds in its center 10 kilometers

away from our location.

Farmers themselves had to go

10 kilometers away to collect these seeds,

whereas India Post was delivering

to their doorstep.

Private competition is great

but the problem of privatization

is that where there is no volume

there is no profit,

and where there is no profit

there is no service.

And they are right in their place.

But if you have been to Spiti

then you would know how difficult

it is to get there.

Only India Post operates there.

If you order something from Amazon there,

you have to go to Manali to pick it up.

The same situation is in Khardungla,

Siachen, Mac Mohan Line, and also on LOC.

We sent our wedding cards

through speed post at a charge

of ₹17 within Mumbai

and ₹35 outside Mumbai,

that's it!

And they were delivered in just two days.

Post is a facility, a necessary facility.

If the post is not perfect,

Then how can one revive the post?

What steps are being taken?

and what should happen next?

We will definitely write another blog

about this.

If you want to read that blog,

then write Save India Post in the comment

so that we know that you are interested

in such blog.

Chapter 4: Conclusion.

Innovation is something that is missing

from our postal department today.

But this doesn't mean we cannot revive it.

To revive it, we will have to adopt

the same approach that Velenkar

adopted 50 years ago.

Indian problems need Indian solutions.

And no one from outside is going

to bring these solutions,

we only have to bring them.

Today's India is not the India of 1971,

we all know this.

So why can't we bring solutions today

at the same level with which

we were able to bring solutions in 1971?

Why can't India be made better

even if it is just one percent?

Today India needs solutions,

it needs people

who want to find solutions.

There is a need for a generation

that fights,

does not give up and runs away,

keeps its mind open,

learns the best knowledge of the world,

and implements it

after coming back to India.

Our salute to Welankar

who found such solutions

and gave us the pin code system.

The saddest part is that

it became impossible for me

to find even a single photo

on the internet of a person

who has touched the lives of all of us.

The person who helped us all find our way

is lost today.

Let's keep his story alive.

Let's share this blog.

I feel lucky that through this blog,

I met an unsung hero of India

who did not succumb to problems.

Because as much as India Post's loss

number is important for India,

this six-digit PIN code is also important,

And conveying this message to you

matters to me.

Hey friends, thank you so much for

reading this blog till the end.

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