Issued by India

Issued on Jul 31, 1991

Issued for : To honour this great cartoonist, the Department of Posts is issuing a set of two stamps.

Description of Designs : The stamps depict two of Shankar’s famous cartoons. The First Day Cover is designed by Shri Sankh Samant and cancellation by Ms. Alka Sharma.

Type : Stamps, Postal Used

Colour : Single colour

Denomination : 400 & 650 Paise

Overall size : 3.91 x 2.90 cms.

Printing size : 3.55 x 2.54 cms.

Perforation : 13 x 13

Paper : Indigenous Un W/M Gravure Coated Stamp Paper

Number Printed : 10,00,000

Number per issue sheet : 35

Printing Process : Photogravure

Printed : India Security Press

Name : Kesava Shankara Pillai

Born on Jul 31, 1902 at Kayamkulam, Alappuzha district, Kerala, India

Died on Dec 26, 1989

About : 

• Keshav Shankar Pillai, popularly known as ‘Shankar’ was one of India’s most celebrated cartoonists. He was born on 31^st July, 1902 in Kayamkulam, in Kerala. After graduating from Maharajah’s College of Science, Trivandrum in 1927 he went to Bombay to join the Law College but soon quit studies and started working.
• Even as a student, Shankar took to cartooning as a hobby and his drawings on political personalities and national events attracted the attention of the newspapers and of the public. He joined ‘The Hindustan Times’ in 1932 and continued as staff cartoonist till 1946.
• Shankar began publishing the ‘Shankar’s Weekly’ in 1948. It abounded in healthy, sparkling humour. The high and mighty came into focus in Shankar’s cartoons. The weekly was closed in August 1975 when Shankar took to the pen. He concentrated on developing the different facets of the Children’s Book Trust (CBT) which he had founded in 1957. Today it is a pioneer publisher of children’s books in India. The object of CBT is to provide well written, well-illustrated and well-designed books for children at affordable prices. The CBT also comprises the International Dolls Museum, the Dolls Designing and Production Centre and Dr. B. C. Roy Library and Reading Room.
• Shankar started the Shankar’s “International Children’s Competition” in 1949, and as a part of it, the Shankar’s “On The Spot Painting Competition” in 1952. He also instituted an annual competition for the Writers of Children’s Books in 1978.
• Shankar was the recipient of numerous awards including Padma Shri (1956), Padma Bhushan (1966) and Padma Vibhushan (1976). Decorations which he received from foreign countries included the Order of Smile – an honour from a Committee of Polish Children (1977), Citation from the Hamilton Branch of the United Nations Association in Canada (1979), Commemorative Medal from the Hungarian Institute of Cultural Relations (1980) and Order de Saint Fortunat from Federal Republic of Germany. In 1984, he was conferred the D. Litt (honoris causa) by the University of Delhi.
• Shankar passed away on December 26, 1989.
• Text : Courtesy matter received from CBT.

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Issued by India

Issued on Sep 17, 1968

Issued for : The Indian Posts and Telegraphs Department is happy to honour Gaganendranath‘s great name by issuing a commemorative stamp with his self-portrait, on the eve of the 101^st anniversary of his birth.

Design : The design of the stamp is vertical and depicts a self portrait of Gaganendranath Tagore. The words Bharat INDIA are shown at the top left hand corner. The year of birth and death viz. 1867-1938 and value 20 paisa, appear at the bottom left and right corners respectively. The name Gaganendranath Thakur (Gaganendranath Tagore) appears below the portrait and outside the design.

Type : Stamp, Mint Condition

Colour : Buff and Red Purple

Denomination : 20 Paisa

Overall Size : 3.91 X 2.90 cms

Printing Size : 3.56 X 2.54 cms

Perforation : 13 x 13

Number per issue Sheet : 35

Printing Process : Photogravure

Printers : India Security Press

Name : Gaganendranath Thakur

Born on Sep 18, 1867 at Jora Sanko, Kolkata, West Bengal, India

Died on Feb 14, 1938 at Kolkata, West Bengal, India

About : 

• The members of the great Tagore family of Bengal were among the pioneers of the Indian Renaissance at the turn of this century. Abanindranath and Gaganendranath, nephews of the great Poet Tagore, gave expression to the new awakening in the field of painting. Gaganendranath was the lesser-known of the two but his work was by no means second-rate.
• Born on September 18, 1867, Gaganendranath took to painting rather late in life. He did not follow the set patterns of the new Bengal School. He broke new ground and took some of his ideas from the Cubist and Futurist schools then in vogue in Europe. But these alien influences did not sweep him off his feet. He remained an Indian painter, first and last. Although his productions owed much to foreign trends there was nothing hybrid about them as they were rooted in true Indian traditions. All through them runs the transforming mark of his originality. “The homely simplicity of his Chaitanya series of paintings, the beauty and breadth of his landscapes, the effortless suggestiveness of his portraits” – these are the distinctive paintings of a great artist.
• Gaganendranath has been called a painter of the modern city. In this, too, his contribution has been unique because most of our artists do not feel quite at home in themes with an urban background. When he paints the evening sky, one recognizes the Calcutta sky, with its smoke and dust. The two women leaning on the parapet wall are confident and self-conscious, not coy and retiring village brides. His Durga Puja Immersion Procession is a spirited representation of a real city street.
• Gaganendranath carved out a niche for himself in another field usually avoided by great painters, that of the cartoonist. The most important of his cartoons date from 1915 to 1922. These were highly expressive and reflected “all the irreverence and irony of the revolutionary“. Cartoons like the “the Scream” series and “Peace restored in the Punjab” (on the Jalianwala Bagh tragedy) were distinguished by the artist’s unfailing courage and directness and left a telling impression on the contemporary viewer.
• Gaganendranath was stricken with facial paralysis about the year 1930, and passed away in 1938. But his memory lives on in his paintings and sketches. Fifty years after his great works began to appear, he still regarded as the most authentic experimentalist of our times. In fact, his talent is being increasingly appreciated with the passing years, a sure indication that his was not the flowering of a transient genius. Artists in India have been celebrating the centenary year of this departed master.

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