YEAR END REVIEW-2021: DEPARTMENT OF POSTS

What is the news?

Department of Posts (DoP) has been the backbone of the country’s communication.It has taken several steps in the year 2021 to strengthen the postal system of India.

Several of those steps are:

Supply Chain and e-Commerce

Nanyatha: It is an app-based monitoring system that contains data pertaining to the location of the letter box, date and time of clearance, number of letters picked up and postal staff number.

Automated Postal Bill of Export (PBE) Software: It is being developed by DoP.It will ease the process of commercial export through the Postal Channel by enabling customs clearance in digital mode. 

International Business Center (IBC): It was inaugurated at Surat to provide a much-needed platform in the region to boost commercial export and will fulfill the demands of exporters.

Banking Services and Financial Inclusion:

Economic Empowerment of Girl Child: Sukanya Samriddhi Account(SSA) scheme was launched by Prime Minister in 2015. The main  aim of the scheme is to encourage parents of a girl child in order to create a fund for the future education and marriage expenses for their child.

Approximately 86% of the total SSA accounts in the country are through Post Offices only.

Five Star Villages Scheme

Postal Life Insurance

Sankalan: It is a e-compendium comprising Post Office Life Insurance Rules, various Standard Operating Procedures, Forms among others.It was released for ease of officials working at various offices as well as for the use of customers and is also available on website.

Sampoorna Bima Gram Yojana: It was launched to provide affordable life insurance services to people, particularly those living in rural areas of the country. Under this, at least one village (having a minimum of 100 households) will be identified in each of the revenue districts of the country. The endeavour will be made to cover all households of that identified village with a minimum of one RPLI (Rural Postal Life Insurance) policy each.  

DARPAN (Digital Advancement of Rural Post Office): It is a part of  larger IT modernisation project being undertaken by the DoP.The project aims to provide a low power technology solution to each Branch Postmaster(BPM) which will enable each of approximately 1.29 Lakhs Branch Post Offices (BOs) to improve the level of services being offered to rural customers across all the states. 

Centralized Public Grievance Redress and Monitoring System (CPGRAMS)

Source: This post is based on the article ‘YEAR END REVIEW-2021: DEPARTMENT OF POSTS’ published in PIB on 5^th Jan 2022.