Once upon a time: Post office floats amid tide of changing times

Maintenance of this Grade I heritage building is a big challenge. “The general maintenance work of this building costs anything from Rs 50 lakh onwards. While we pay for that, we need to carry out conservation of the building which we cannot afford as it will cost us Rs 16 crore and we don’t have the funds. We are now looking at private players to help us,” said Kumar. During monsoons, the facade has to be covered with plastic to protect it from damage.

Constructed between 1904 and 1913, it had cost 18,09,000 rupees then. This land previously housed staff quarters of St John’s Hospital. The Business Hall of GPO is unique with 101 counters, following the addition of the 1200 square metre large bi-centenary hall.
“The earlier post office building was near the docks. It was shifted next to Victoria Railway Terminus, now the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus, after construction of the railway network so that all mail dispatches were brought in and delivered using railways,” said Kumar.
Heavily influenced by Islamic style of architecture, the dome is designed on the lines of Gol Gumbaz of Bijapur. The lift of the building is the second oldest operational lift in the city.

Presently, over 1500 people work here. For the past decade, it has been trying to provide online services to be an attractive option for the younger generation. “There are over 350 post offices in Mumbai and 1100 post offices if you include outskirts of Navi Mumbai. We are trying to ensure all our services including banking are available online and have a target of 2017 for this across India. Right now, you can access your postal account from any post office,” said Kumar.

He adds there is a need to bring about a postal transformation. “People don’t write letters anymore. The number of letters we receive has been going down by 10 percent every year,” he said.

The post office is increasingly becoming the agency for delivering government’s social service schemes, and pension schemes.
“In 2003, we started with e-post, our way to bridge the digital divide. Under this service you could write an e-mail and it would be delivered to the post office next to the person’s address if he doesn’t have access to a computer,” said Kumar.
This service was a hit with stock market agents. Their instant money order services is widely used. Most of its revenue comes from financial services provided by GPOs.

The need to keep up with technology has meant training employees so that they are well-versed with technology. “The entire staff was given training from 2013-15. There are technological challenges but we are trying to overcome them. For instance, now posts like postal assistant require a person to know how to operate computers,” said Kumar.

Another area they are trying to re-invent is the philatelic section. “Youngsters collecting stamps have decreased. We are trying to promote stamps as story telling vehicles,” he added. They have held philatelic exhibitions. A recent stamp festival in Navi Mumbai saw children talking about their favourite stamps. They wrote and mailed post cards.

Another challenge faced by the GPO is that with shift of focus from South Mumbai to Northern and Suburban areas, it is no longer as profitable as Dadar and Navi Mumbai post offices. “It is growing but not as much as Dadar GPO,” he admits.

The only growing area for GPOs seems to be parcel processing centers with the boom in the e-commerce. But they still haven’t given up on the idea of doing things the old way and are opening a gift shop in Mumbai GPO, which will sell stationery and curios. This shop is expected to be operational by January 26.

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