FPS’ 5-day off annoys local exporters

FPS’ 5-day off annoys local exporters
BILAL HUSSAIN
Srinagar: The lone Foreign Post Services (FPS) in General Post Office here is giving serious bouts to the local exporters. Reason: The FPS remains closed five days a week and functions only for two days. Exporters say in absence of rail link, unreliable communication network, and poor postal service in the Valley, the FPS has a critical role. “But when it (FPS) works only two days a week, it causes immense problems for us and sometimes even entails business losses,” they said. Exporters say the overall postal service in the Valley is poor. “The tepid postal services in the Valley are not just affecting the masses in general, they are adversely affecting the business community and exporters in particular,” said former President, Kashmir Chamber of Commerce and Industries, Rouf Punjabi. “Although the high-tech facilities and fast communications have brought a revolution in the world, when it comes to physical movement of items technologies cannot help,” said Tawseef, a local businessman, adding for the physical movement of the goods you need fast postal and courier services. Apart from the business community, the insufficient services at FPS annoy the common people as well. “I have to send a gift pack to my son working in Dubai. For the purpose I went to the GPO on Thursday, but only to learn that the foreign counter is operating only for two days,” said Mustaq Ahmad of Sopur. Ahmad was perturbed when he was told to come next week. “This is mockery of the services. I came all the way from Sopur to here. But now I will have to repeat the same laborious routine next week to get a simple work done,” he said. When contacted General Postmaster Srinagar, K S Parma, said it is true that the postal service counter at GPO operates for two days a week viz. on Monday and Wednesday. “We don’t have any problem in keeping it open for full week but the problem is with customs department,” he said. The postmaster ascertains that they get lots of request and queries for extending the services for five days a week. To mention the J&K has got the postal network as early as 1864 when the then head of the state Maharaja in a meeting with the then postmaster general, Hogg, asked the latter to extend the network to the state. Later an Imperial Post Office in Srinagar was opened and the process to send mail to outside with British postal stamps in addition to J&K’s state postal stamps was initiated. On June 26, 1878 Maharaja Ranbir Singh inaugurated the telegraph service between Srinagar and Jammu by sending a wire message to the then governor of J&K Wazir Panu. In 1882 the money order service was introduced.