Postal orders of Rs 10 denomination in severe shortfall ahead of polls in Bengaluru

Indian Postal Orders (IPOs) of Rs 10 denomination, commonly used to file Right to Information (RTI) applications, have become scarce in post offices prior to the Assembly polls.

Post offices in the General Post Office (GPO), Yeshwantpur, New Thippasandra, HAL 2nd Stage, Vijayanagar, Rajajinagar, Malleswaram, RPC Layout, Seshadripuram, and Sampangiramnagar are among places where IPOs have been in shortage for the past one month.

Citizens regularly filing RTI applications said they met the Chief Postmaster General, Karnataka, and Chief Postmaster, Bengaluru, 15 days ago to appraise them about the shortage.

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“It does not take many days to bring the fresh stock but the situation remains the same. There is a huge shortage of Rs 10 IPOs,” a city-based advocate and RTI activist T Narasimha Murthy said.

Murthy speculated that the scarcity of postal orders may be limited to Karnataka, and specifically to Bengaluru.

“Almost all post offices I visited in Bengaluru did not have a stock of IPOs for over a month, so I sent my colleague to bring it from Hosur,” he said.

Senior RTI activist S Bhaskaran said many post offices do not have postal orders carrying Rs 5, Rs 10 and Rs 20 denominations.

“The Rs 10 IPO is most popular as it is being used by many to file RTIs. If the postal department cannot fix the shortage immediately, the Centre must consider introducing an online system where IPOs can be purchased,” he said.

S Rajendra Kumar, Chief Postmaster General of Karnataka, told DH that there is a scarcity of IPOs valued at Rs 10.

‘Will shift the stock’

“We have over 1 lakh postal orders (of Rs 10 value) across the state but the stock in Bengaluru is around 4,000. We are making arrangements to shift the stock to post offices where there is a shortage,” he said.