India Post hires more mail carriers
Enthused with the success of the freighter hired last month to carry postal material from Kolkata to north-eastern states, the India Post department is believed to have been planning to hire three more freighters for the same purpose.
According to sources, the three separate routes on which three hired freighters would fly are said to have been identified. However, they are yet to be finalized. One hurdle is said to have been coming in the way of the finalization— The destination of the route must be reached within six hours as the duty of freighter crews comes to an end in six hours. If the freighter takes more than six hours to reach its destination, it would be more costly for the department.
The proposed routes may be from Delhi to Mumbai via Nagpur, Bangalore to Chennai and Hyderabad to Kolkata. With the beginning of new projects, besides other parts of the country, north India and central India might reap the benefits of quick service of the postal department.
According to sources, postal department wants to quicken its services as private players (courier service providers) are giving a tough competition to the government-owned postal department. This is the reason why the postal department wants to end dependence on the railways. The second reason behind hiring more freighters is that the first experiment of postal department of hiring freighter for north-eastern states has been successful. In the beginning, the department was apprehending whether it would be able to collect 15 tones of postal material everyday as the said freighter has 15 tones load capacity.
