Letter from the Mumbai General Post Office

A postcard arrived some weeks ago, yes, by post, delivered by a postman, which was staggering in itself because it was not a utility bill or a wedding invitation—the only two things that usually arrive this way. Most other communication ends up being just a WhatsApp message or an email if it’s more than a sentence. Anyway, the card came from Antarctica, which was additionally staggering for I didn’t know it had a postal department.

The postcard, sent by an adventurous relative from Petermann Island, had a stamp showing a penguin seemingly squatting by a lake with snow-capped mountains in the background (the picture on the card itself has been described as “Adelie penguins cautiously diving into the water”). These words were printed on top of the stamp: British Antarctic Territory. The card, with the stamp on it, has gone into storage, but rekindled an interest in what was once a fleeting hobby, of collecting.

Some collect (anything: coins, bottle corks, pens, paper clips, marbles...) for fun, some for investment, some to enhance social interactions, some to retain a connection with the past. The charm lies in its perpetuity: You can continue collecting forever. If it goes extinct or out of production, like HMT watches or Mithun Chakraborty movies from the 1980s, then its value increases because the number of pieces and number of owners decrease.

So, what happens to the hobby of collecting stamps? Will it die, because no one sends letters anymore? Will they need to be added to email, like a virtual stamp, which might become a paid service at some point because Google decides it’s not satisfied with its $75 billion annual turnover?

Today, there are many choices for communication—email, WhatsApp, good old phone calls—all of them made increasingly cheaper as technology spreads rapidly. Additionally, attention spans have become shorter and options taller, so one does not need a hobby—indeed, the definition of a hobby itself has changed. Several résumés I have received from job applicants over the past two years mention “Internet surfing” as a hobby, which it is not, just like “rain watching”.

Part of the answer lies with India Post. At the Mumbai General Post Office, a colonial-style building that has an equal amount of touristic value as it has practical use, there is an active philately department trying to make it increasingly accessible for hobbyists to collect stamps (become a member, make a kitty and get stamps delivered upon release with the cost debited automatically from the fund) or order online—ironically the very Internet that’s facilitating this convenience is also the reason why collectors will become as rare as their possessions.

The postmaster general of Mumbai, P.N. Ranjit Kumar, told me there is no doubt that letter writing, or the lack of it, has had an effect on collecting, “because the best publicity for a stamp is when it’s on a letter”.

Globally, there is an annual decline of 4% in letter writing (no such figures are available for India, though it’s probably a little less here). Paradoxically though, philately itself has been generating more revenue for India Post not because, they say, of a more focused effort in developing it—but primarily due to the rise of e-commerce.

The Philatelic Society of India, affiliated to the Philatelic Congress of India, is among several groups that hold exhibitions and competitions to push interest, including one next Republic Day, to celebrate 120 years of its existence.

Indian stamps have traditionally not been made for commercial benefits, as they are in several other countries, including Bhutan. In these nations, some stamps are also made for the sole purpose of commerce, and therefore get that kind of attention. Bhutan, for example, prints its stamps abroad to attain a certain quality.

Commerce becomes secondary to India Post also because politics takes priority, as lawmakers and political parties use stamps as a tool for their propaganda or populist measures. Political involvement has proportionately diminished the aesthetic value of stamps, a postal department official told me.

Stamps are of two kinds: definitive and commemorative. Definitive stamps are the ones used daily; the latter are released for special occasions, or in tribute to special people. Collectors often form themes with their collections, like birds of India or the postal history of Indore.

Because stamps here are not made for commerce, it also affects their aesthetic value, primarily because of low investment in developing the art form, poor technology in production and a lack of innovation. Censorship also often takes the edge out of a commemorative stamp, as design artists can express themselves only within government-imposed restrictions.

Sometimes, a design has to be turned out in a few hours due to an urgent need or someone’s memory lapse, which reflects in its detailing. Some collectors mentioned with awe the 22-carat gold embossed stamps of France or others like cloth-embroidered ones, whereas the quality of material used in India fails to get a stamp of approval from collectors.

India Post helped me get in touch with one of its artists, Sankha Samanta, in New Delhi, who put a lot of things in perspective. Any individual or institution can propose a stamp, which, if approved by an advisory committee, could get made. There is a panel of artists who design them.

Samanta says when he gets a topic, say a charkha, he researches it to find out what hasn’t been done on the subject so far. He has to be artistic, but also literal, so whoever sees the stamp can make the connections to what it’s about. He chose a box-type charkha, or a pethi, which Mohandas Gandhi himself used since it could be folded up for travel. Samanta then tries to imbibe all the knowledge, the history and the symbolism of the charkha during what he calls a meditative process.

The design needs to be stark, simple. Then there are restrictions because this is documentation, not an artistic expression. For example, if you have a flower, say a Rajnigandha, you cannot be “Van Goghish” about it, he says. It’s not Samanta’s painting that’s selling, it’s the Rajnigandha. You have the liberty of making that particular flower as beautiful as you can, he adds. It will then go through a final approval process.

People who deal with stamps, either as issuing authorities or collectors, believe the hobby will continue to exist, but might reform to reflect changing times. The child who started by ripping it off an envelope would not be the future collector. Most new collectors would come from within families of collectors and they would be more focused; they would collect with enduring passion and not just as a passing fad.

So, even if the number of collectors decrease, they would be more specialized. It would also be the commemorative stamps that would survive longer, unless e-commerce manages to keep the definitive going.

Even if it’s an appealing interest for children, at some point, they would be told by their parents that they need to pay attention to academics or that there is no money to buy stamps. Only children of philatelists would get the right kind of motivation.

For example, Kapil Gogri, a governing council member of The Philatelic Society of India, who is also documenting the postal history of Indore, has a pre-teen daughter who is now a collector.

I hope to find those three or four surviving stamps from my childhood, to reconnect with the past, to feel sentimental. A penguin will get added to them, which will make the collection seem new.