Postal Department Seeks Dedicated Aircraft for e-commerce

By Express News Service

Published: 03rd April 2015 05:58 AM

 

BENGALURU: A plea to sanction a fleet of dedicated aircraft for the Postal Department to deliver e-commerce shipments was made by M S Ramanujan, Chief Postmaster General (CPMG) of Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala postal circles.

 

At a function organised at the GPO on Thursday, where Union Minister for Communications and Information Technology Ravi Shankar Prasad inaugurated five major initiatives for the Bengaluru Division and released a special cover on ‘Golden Chariot’, Ramanujam said the department’s e-commerce business in the last financial year had touched Rs 100 crore and it is slated to reach Rs 200 crore in 2015-2016. “With the booming air cargo business, we need dedicated aircraft for the transfer of air mail cargo,” he said. The department has been facing hurdles in using private airlines and Air India for the purpose, he added.

 

He later told Express that three freight aircraft had been taken on lease from Air India for a four-year period, which expired in 2010. Since then, consignments booked through the department have been facing delays as private airlines and Air India gave priority to human organs being shipped for transplantation and transportation of perishable goods like flowers and vegetables as they are high value goods Ramanujan said. “These offer airlines high premium and so articles booked by the Postal Department are offloaded and dispatched later. This results in delayed delivery to customers,” he said.

 

Single Day Delivery

 

The Postal Department will launch a same-day delivery scheme for Amazon in Bengaluru on Monday. “This will be extended to other e-commerce giants in the future, the CPMG said.

Meanwhile, Prasad called on the Postal Department to leverage its vast network, particularly the 1.25 lakh post offices in villages, to implement the Centre’s many Direct Benefit Transfer Schemes as well.

 

State Higher Education and Tourism Minister R V Deshpande said the proposal to convert the post office (Senior Superintendent of Post Offices) on Museum Road into a heritage building had been approved.

 

He also called upon the corporate world to take up maintenance of heritage buildings.

 

State’s 1st Postal ATM Opened

 

Karnataka’s first ATM to withdraw money from post office accounts was inaugurated by Union Communications and Information Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad at the GPO on Raj Bhavan Road on Thursday. The state will have 76 such ATMs by December, a top official told Express. “Of these, 17 will be readied in two months, of which six will be installed in Bengaluru.” They will come up at the head offices (HO) in HAL IInd Stage, RT Nagar, Basavangudi, Jayanagar, Jalahalli and Rajajinagar. The rest will come up in other parts of the state. The ATM cards can be used in any postal ATM in the country.