Mumbai Region’s postal office to name 2 as "smartest postman" every month

Postmaster General Swati Pandey (centre) with the four Smartest Postman awardees

A smart postman is coming to your doorstep! Not many may have noticed but the ubiquitous postman is slowly changing. It is not just about delivering letters, stamping, and sorting, but things have evolved. It is now more about technology, the new postal app, and offering online help to customers.

Postwoman Shobha Chogle with Postmaster General Swati Pandey

While many have learnt the new system well, Mumbai Region's postal office has come up with a novel way to encourage them further by naming two as ‘Smartest Postman' every month and giving them a badge. The two postmen, or postwomen, will be chosen on merit every month by the Postmaster General. The criteria they will be judged on will be thoroughness of technology, overall get-up, look, feel and neatness of uniform.The initiative is the brainchild of Mumbai's Postmaster General Swati Pandey. The badge has been designed in-house with the help of philatelist and a representative of India as a Fellow for the Royal Philatelic Society, London, Kapil Gogri.

Why the award?
"Postmen have been serving us since time immemorial. However, they have never been rewarded for their arduous work and the tedious miles they cover. What is more impressive is that in this modern era, the get-up, look and feel and the personality of a postman has undergone a phenomenal change too! They have been trained to operate the latest post office mobile applications and each of them has become equally well-groomed, tech-savvy and smart in their work. So to acknowledge their efforts and encourage the makeover of their image, we have initiated the ‘Smartest Postman' campaign," Pandey said. Two postmen - Shobha Dinesh Chogle and Vilas Shankar Rane - from the Mumbai General Post Office (GPO) and two from Kalbadevi Head Post office - Shyamal Doye and Chetan Salimath - have been awarded the Smartest Postmen badge for the two months of 2021.

"In my 29 years of service, this is the first time that I have received such an honour. Seeing the badge on my uniform, people have started respecting me even more. I thank Pandey ma'am for encouraging the postmen cadre and creating healthy competition. Everyone now has the aim to do better," Chogle said.