Curtains fall on India's telegram service, forever
Curtains came down today on the 163-year-old telegram service in the
country - the harbinger of good and bad news for generations of Indians -
amid a last minute rush of people thronging telegraph offices to send
souvenir messages to family and friends.
A large people, many of
them youngsters and first timers, turned up at four telegraph centres in
the Capital which have almost been forgotten in recent years to send a
message to their loved ones on the last day of the service.
Among them were housewifes, college students, morning joggers in track
suits, old timers and office goers lining up, taking time off on a
holiday. Some children, accompanied by parents, also sent their life's
first and last telegram.
"This is the first time I am sending a
telegram. It is for my 96-year-old grandfather who lives in a village
near Trichy," Anand Sathiyaseelan, a lawyer by profession, said.
A manager in a real estate firm Vikas Arvind said he was sending greetings to his parents in Bareilly.
"This I hope they will keep it as a memorabilia," Arvind said.
"Hope all is well" and "An iconic service comes to an end" were among the messages sent today.
Once
the fastest means of communication for millions of people, the end of
the humble telegram service left behind a string of happy and bitter
memories for people across the country.
The last telegram will be preserved as a museum piece.
the staff at the telegram counters were increased today in view of the anticipated rush.
Started
in 1850 on an experimental basis between Kolkata and Diamond Harbour,
it was opened for use by the British East India Company the following
year. In 1854, the service was made available to the public.
It
was such an important mode of communication in those days that
revolutionaries fighting for the country's independence used to cut the
telegram lines to stop the British from communicating.
Though
started as a Morse code service, the telegram service evolved gradually
with the use of computers. At the time of its death, it had become a web
based telegraph mailing service (WBTMS) which used emails to instantly
convey message to the other end.
Nudged out by technology --- SMS, emails, mobile phones -- the iconic
service gradually faded into oblivion with less and less people taking
recourse to it.
Old timers recall that receiving a telegram would
be an event itself and the messages were normally opened with a sense
of trepidation as people feared for the welfare of their near and dear
ones.
For jawans and armed forces seeking leave or waiting for
transfer or joining reports, it was a quick and handy mode of
communication.
July 19, 2013
Kalaivaraikalai
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