Issued by India

Issued on Oct 9, 2024

Issued for : To commemorate the UPU’s 150^th anniversary, the Department of Posts, Government of India is proud to release a special set of three postage stamps. These commemorative stamps celebrate the UPU’s rich history and its enduring impact on global communication. They serve as a tribute to the Union’s achievements and its ongoing efforts to connect people around the world. The stamps not only honor the UPU’s legacy but also reflect the significance of postal services in bridging distances and fostering understanding among nations. They symbolize the shared values cooperation, innovation, and inclusivity that underpin the UPU’s work.

Credits :
Miniature Sheet/FDC/Brochure/Cancellation Cachet : Shri Anuj Kumar

Type : Miniature Sheet, Mint Condition

Colour : Multi Colour

Denomination : 1500, 1500, 1500 Paise

Stamps Printed : 111350

Printing Process : Wet Offset

Printer : Security Printing Press, Hyderabad

About : 

• The Universal Postal Union (UPU) was established on October 9, 1874, in Bern, Switzerland. This year marks the 150^th anniversary of the UPU, a milestone that not only highlights its enduring legacy but also underscores its pivotal role in shaping modern postal services. It was founded to create a single postal territory for the reciprocal exchange of mail among its member countries. The UPU was one of the first international organizations, and its establishment marked a significant step towards global cooperation in postal services.
• The creation of the UPU was driven by the need for standardized postal regulations and practices to facilitate international mail delivery. With its 192 member countries, the UPU is the primary forum for cooperation between postal sector players. It helps to ensure a truly universal network of up-to-date products and services. Before the UPU’s inception, sending mail across borders was fraught with challenges. Different countries had their postal systems, rates, and regulations, which made international correspondence cumbersome and expensive.
• The UPU’s structure consists of several key organs that ensure its efficient functioning and oversight, The Congress, The Council of Administration, The Postal Operations Council, The Consultative Committee, The International Bureau.
• The Universal Postal Union (UPU) is dedicated to promoting and coordinating international postal services, enhancing operational efficiency, and ensuring accessibility for all. Its mission is to guarantee that individuals everywhere can access high-quality postal services, irrespective of their geographical location.
• To achieve this, the UPU establishes regulations and standards that govern the exchange of international mail, thereby improving the speed and reliability of postal services. Additionally, the UPU encourages member countries to modernize their postal systems, making them more efficient, sustainable, and adaptable to the evolving global landscape.
• India, being one of the oldest members of the UPU and having the largest postal network in the world, has played an integral role in the Union’s activities and development. India’s participation in the UPU reflects its commitment to enhancing global postal services and supporting the growth of postal infrastructure in less developed regions. In recent years, India Post has been working on the lines of UPU to modernize postal services by promoting e-commerce and digital financial services, improving tracking and tracing systems for mail and packages, and enhancing the security and reliability of postal services through the use of advanced technologies. The Department of Posts, Government of India has been instrumental in sharing its expertise and resources to help other countries improve their postal systems. This collaborative approach aligns with the UPU’s mission to foster international cooperation and ensure that the benefits of an efficient postal network are accessible to all.
• Text : Referenced from content available on UPU website.

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Issued by India

Issued on Oct 9, 1999

Issued for : On 9^th October – a day celebrated throughout the World as World Post Day – the Treaty of Berne, establishing the “General Postal Union” was signed (1874). Membership grew so quickly that the name was changed in 1878 to “Universal Postal Union”. India, as one of the oldest members of the U.P.U. (1876), has been associated intimately with the activities of the Union. The 125^th anniversary of U.P.U. is commemorated with issue of a set of four stamps, on the theme of “ancient and continuing rural arts and crafts traditions”, signifying the underlying unity in the tremendous diversity.

Credits :
Stamp & FDC : Based on material furnished by Jyotindra Jain, National Handicrafts and Handlooms Museum, New Delhi.
Cancellation : Alka Sharma

Type : Stamps, Mint Condition

Colour : Multi Colour

Denomination : 300, 300, 300 & 1500 Paise

Overall size : 3.91 x 2.90 cms.

Printing size : 3.55 x 2.54 cms.

Perforation : 13 x 13

Paper : Imported unwatermarked Adhesive Gravure Coated Stamp Paper in Sheets 50.8 x 53.5 cms.

Stamps Printed : One Million Each

Number per issue sheet : 35/Each

Printing Process : Photogravure

Printer : India Security Press, Nashik

About : 

• The Sanskrit word ‘shilpa’ refers to all forms of creative expression including skill, craft, a work of art or architecture, design, ritual, ability and creativity. The patterns that the crafts traditions in India were to take appeared already mature and firmly established in the cities of the Indus Valley. The rural craft idiom was based on vernacular forms of the artisan guild. Inherent in it was total anonymity. The Indian rural arts are the art of people with lives tuned to the rhythm of nature and its laws, the craftsman and his art serving as ritual contributors in ceremonies, such as birth, initiation, marriage, death, seasonal festivals. The items produced by the craftsmen, form an integral part of the socio-religious order of traditional and contemporary village and tribal life.
• Traditions of Indian Folk Painting : Painted Myths
  • These traditions date back to a period that may be referred to as “timeless”. These are “living”, traditions linked with the regional historico-cultural settings from which they rise. These may be executed on a wall: “bhitti–chitra”, on a canvas: “pata chitra”, and on the floor: “dhuli–chitra”, or “bhumi–shobha”. The twin functions of Indian folk painting are magico-religious ritual and narration and hence they are more than just decorative. The stamp portrays a tribal wall painting of the Rathwa tribe, depicting “a myth of creation”. In their oral tradition the Rathwa tribe inhabiting the hilly regions of eastern Gujarat and adjoining part of Madhya Pradesh has preserved a creation myth narrating the story of their ancestral Gods, Pithoro and Babo Ind. During certain festivals they paint the legend of Pithoro on the central wall of their hut in a sacred enclosure. The main theme of this painting is the marriage procession of Pithoro and Pithori, witnessed by the Gods as well as several other mythological incidents.
• Jewellery : ceremonial ornaments
  • Folk and tribal jewellery of India’s richly varied in the material used (lac, glass, shells and beads, silver and a particular type of white metal, alloy of copper or tin and pewter, that imitates silver) as well as design and mode of wearing. The stamp design depicts a necklace of conch shell and beads of glass, shell and stone of the Angami tribe of Nagaland. The colourful beads and the delicate dotted etching of dancing human figures on the conch together make for an elaborate ceremonial ornament characteristic of the proud and valiant Nagas. The tribal metalsmith of India used to fashion jewellery by the age-old lost-wax process. Ritually, gold and silver are accorded a high status in the hierarchy of auspicious metals. Each technique has its specialist craftsperson whose family has been practising the craft for over three to four generations.
• Metal forms : symbolic representations of a metaphysical concept
  • Archaeological evidence established that the art of bronze casting has been continuously practised in India for more than five millennia. The tribal metal craftsman fashions his image in the manner of his forefathers by the same procedure of drawing out wax wires and carefully wrapping them over the inner clay core. His creativity lies in his representations of nature, in his creation of a timeless beauty that underline a unique synthesis of form and function. Each metal image is invested with its peculiar indigenous socio-religious history. The tribal metalsmith’s creative imagination is a spontaneous expression of a communal tradition. Each metal is believed to process its own alchemic properties and the image is really a symbolic representation of a metaphysical concept. The stamp design depicts the “fertility ring” of the Muria tribe, Bastar, Madhya Pradesh. Such rings depicting a farmer with a pair of bullocks, a field with rich harvest, a draw well and landlords coming to collect their share are presented to the bride at the time of their marriage and are worn for seed sowing ceremonies.
• Dolls, Toys, Puppets and Masks
  • Almost every region of India is renowned for its distinctive tradition of toys, variety of puppetry traditions. Masks of various mediums, metals, wood, clay, gourd, papier mache etc. are used in ceremonies. The stamp design shows the four headed mask for Chhau dance, West Bengal or Bihar; pigment painting on papier mache and gauze. Chhau is a unique combination of pure dance recital and a pantomime, generally symbolising the victory of good over evil in mythical, religious and secular themes and the mask is intended to unleash in the dancer the vital qualities of the personified characters.
• Text : Based on material furnished by Jyotindra Jain, National Handicrafts and Handlooms Museum, New Delhi.

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Issued by People’s Republic of China

Issued on Dec 22, 1998

Issued for : UPU, 22^nd Congress, Beijing ’99 World Philatelic Exhibition

Picture : Different Fishes from the Coral Reefs :- 1. 200 f – Pomacanthus imperator, 2. 200 f – Plectropomus maculatus, 3. 200 f – Chaetodon plebeius, 4. 200 f – Chaetodon chrysurus (vertical), 5. 200 f – Heniochus acuminatus (vertical), 6. 200 f – Lutjanus sebae, 7. 200 f – Balistoides conspicillum and 8. 150 f – Pygoplites diancanthus

Type : Sheet of 8 Stamps + Label, Mint Condition

Colour : Multicolored

Denomination : 200 Fen each

Perforation : 11½

Printing Process : Photogravure

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Issued by People’s Republic of China

Issued on May 15, 1998

Issued for : 22^nd UPU (Universal Postal Union) Congress held at Beijing, China.

Picture : 1. 50 f – Emblem, horizontal and 2. 540 f – Emblem, vertical

Type : Stamps, Mint Condition

Colour : Multicolored

Denomination : 50 & 540 Fen

Perforation : 12

Printing Process : Lithographed

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A commemorative postage stamp on Heinrich von Stephan, founder of Universal Postal Union (UPU) :

Issued by India

Issued on Apr 8, 1981

Issued for : Indian Posts & Telegraphs Department is privileged to issue a commemorative postage stamp in his honour.

Description of Designs : The stamp design consists of portrait of Heinrich Von Stephan alongwith the U.P.U. emblem.

Type : Stamp, Postal Used

Colour : Blue & Red Brown

Denomination : 100 Paise

Overall Size : 4.06 X 2.75 cms.

Printing Size : 3.70 X 2.40 cms.

Name : Ernst Heinrich Wilhelm Stephan

Born on Jan 7, 1831 at Slupsk, Pomerania, Poland

Died on Apr 8, 1897 at Berlin, Germany

About : 

• Heinrich von Stephan was born on 7^th January 1831 in Pomerania. After his schooling, he entered the Prussian postal service after his schooling, at the age of 17. He quickly passed through the various rungs of his chosen profession and soon found himself at Cologne, the metropolis of the Rhine provinces and the focus of postal services between Germany, Western Europe and transmarine countries. From Cologne to the highest postal administrative body in Prussia in Berlin was the next step. In 1870, when the position of General Post Director (the head of the postal administration in Germany) fell vacant, Von Stephan was chosen to fill the post on the strength of his wide-ranging reputation and outstanding abilities.
• After the Franco-German War, Von Stephan set himself to achieve the greatest task of his life, the setting up of the Universal Postal Union. As far back as 1869, the Government of North German Federation had entered into negotiations with the French Government for summoning a postal congress to discuss uniformity of postal relations among European states and the formation of a general postal union. It was not until Jul 1, 1873 that the German Government was able to lay the draft of a general postal convention prepared by Stephan before the Governments of Europe and at Washington. On Sep 15, 1874 the Congress, with representatives of 22 states of both hemispheres, met in the old historic building of the National Senate in Berne (Switzerland). The Congress appointed Von Stephan the Chairman of the Commission set up to examine the draft conventions. Due to his initiative, diplomatic skill and intimate knowledge of postal matters, the General Postal Convention was signed within a short period of 24 days on Oct 9, 1874 and the ‘General Postal Union’ came into existence.
• Stephan now devoted his life to the extension of the Universal Postal Union (UPU) as it came to be known later. His sole consideration was the unity of UPU. He used his eloquence, the warmth of his conviction and the force of his arguments to settle the disputes and to push into background insignificant objections and secondary matters. He passed away on 8 April 1897.
• (Text by Courtesy of U.P.U.)

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Issued by Japan

Issued on Jun 20, 1977

Issued for : To commemorate the Centenary of the Admission of Japan to the Universal Postal Union (UPU), a set of two postage stamps and a souvenir sheet comprising two stamps will be issued. The UPU was formed in 1874 and its membership now numbers 157 countries and Japan is one of principal member countries.

Design : (A) Pigeon carrying letter and postbox with emblem of UPU and (B) Japanese mail flag in the early Meiji era and emblem of UPU joined one another with map of globe.

Designer : (A) Mr. Masatoshi Hioki and (B) Mr. Motoharu Morita

Colour : Multicolour

Type : Stamps, Postal Used

Denomination : 50 & 100 Yen

Printing Process : Photogravure

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Issued by India

Issued on Apr 1, 1977

Issued for : India joined the Asian Oceanic Postal Union in 1973 and has been actively participating in the affairs of the Union. The AOPU has now completed 15 years of its service to the countries of the region.

The Indian P & T Department is happy to mark the occasion by issuing a commemorative postage stamp.

Description of Design : The design pf the stamp is symbolic based on the emblem of the Asian Oceanic Postal Union.

Type : Stamp, Postal Used

Colour : Multicolour

Denomination : 200 Paise

Overall size : 3.91 X 2.90 cms.

Printing size : 3.55 X 2.54 cms.

Perforation : 13 x 13

Watermark : Printed on unwatermarked adhesive stamp paper

Number printed : 20,00,000

Number per issue sheet : 35

Printing process : Photogravure

Designed and printed at : India Security Press

About : 

• Most of the countries in the world are members of the Universal Postal Union. The Constitution of this Union permits members to form themselves into restricted unions covering specific regions of the globe. Special agreements are concluded to facilitate cooperation and improvement in the postal services of the member countries within the region, provided such agreements introduce provisions more favourable to the members of the public than those provided by the acts of the UPU. Further a restricted Union has the important role of promoting postal development in the region. cooperating with the UPU and the regional economic commissions in the implementation of technical assistance programmes in respect of postal services and strengthening relations with the other restricted Unions. At present the following seven restricted Unions are functioning in different parts of the world:
  

  		Headquarters
  1	European Conference of Postal and Telecommunications Administrations (CEPT)	Stockholm
  2	The African Posts and Telecommunications Union (APTU)	Brazzaville
  3	The Arab Postal Union (UPA)	Cairo
  4	The Postal Union of the Americas and Spain (PUAS)	Santiago
  5	The African Postal Union (APU)	Cairo
  6	Asian-Oceanic Postal Union (AOPU)	Manila
  7	The Nordic Postal Union (UPPN)	Helsinki

• The Asian Oceanic Postal Union was established in 1962 with headquarters and Central Office in Manila in Philippines. The membership of the Union is open to the countries of the Asian Oceanic region. At present the Union comprises Australia, Bangladesh, China (People’s Republic), India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Laos, Malaysia, New Zealand, Pakistan, Philippines, Papua New Guinea and Thailand. Some more countries are expected to join soon.
• The supreme organ of the Union is the Congress comprising all the members and is held once in 5 years. The main function of the Congress is to revise the Constitution of the restricted Union. The Executive Council in which all the members are represented ensures the continuity of the work of the Union during the interval between the Congresses and also supervises the work of the Central Office of the Union.
• Concessions in postal tariffs are given by the member countries on the surface letter mail addressed to other member countries on a reciprocal basis. This is of direct advantage to the users of postal services of this region.

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Issued by Nepal

Issued on Oct 9, 1974 (corresponding to 2031 Aswin 23)

Issued by :
His Majesty’s Government
Postal Services Dept.
Nepal Philatelic Bureau
Kathmandu

Designer : K. Karmacharya

Type : Stamp, Postal Used

Denomination : Rs. 1

Colour : Bi–colour

Size : 2.86 x 3.40 Cms

Perforation : 13 x 13

Paper : Gummed paper

Quantity : 2,000,000

Sheet : 50

Process : Litho Offset

Printer : The Pakistan Security Printing Corporation, Karachi, Pakistan

About : 

• “The Countries adopting this Constitution comprise, under the title of the Universal Postal Union, a single postal territory for the reciprocal exchange of letter post items. Freedom of transit is guaranteed throughout the entire territory of the Union.”

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Issued by Great Britain

Issued on Jun 12, 1974

Issued for : The 100^th Anniversary of the Universal Postal Union (1874 – 1974).

Picture : Development of Overseas Mail Transport :- 3½ p – P&O Packet “Peninsular,” 1888 & “Southampton Packet Letter” Postmark, 5½ p – First Official Airmail Coronation, 1911 : Farnham Biplane & “Aerial Post” Postmark, 8 p – Airmail Blue Van and Post Box, 1930 & “London F.S. Air Mail” Postmark and 10 p –  Imperial Airways Flying Boat, 1937 & “Southampton Airport” Postmark.

Colour : Multicoloured

Type : Stamps, Mint Condition

Denomination : 3½, 5½, 8 & 10 Pence

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Issued by Nepal

Issued on Oct 9, 1970 (2027.6.23)

Design : The new Headquarters Building of the Universal Postal Union in Berne, Switzerland, was officially opened on 20^th May, 1970. The commemorative stamp is being issued today, the anniversary of the founding of the Union on 9^th October 1874, as part of the international celebration of U.P.U. Day 1970.

Designer : K. Karmacharya

Type : Stamp, Postal Used

Denomination : Rs. 2.50

Colour : Chest–nut and Raw Sienna

Size : 4.06 cms x 2.28 cms.

Perforation : 14.5 x 14

Paper : Unwatermarked and gummed

Quantity : 2,50,000

Sheet : 50

Printing process : Photogravure

Printer : India Security Press

About : 

• The new building consists of two blocks, an office block with floor space of 150,000 square feet and a smaller conference block. In addition to offices and conference halls the building contains a library, reading room, exhibition hall, museum hall, restaurant and a garage for 150 cars. The design and dimensions of the new building reflect the all round growth of the Universal Postal Union in recent years.

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