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DAILY NEWS ANALYSIS

  • 17 August, 2022

  • 5 Min Read

PIN Code History

PIN Code History

Postal Index Number (PIN) completed 50 Years.

About PIN code

  • At the time of Independence, India had 23,344 post offices, most of which were located in urban areas.
  • The postal system had to keep up with the nation's fast growth.
  • As a result, it was first made available in India on August 15, 1972.
  • Shriram Bhikaji Velankar, a senior member of the Posts and Telegraphs Board and additional secretary in the Union Ministry of Communications, was the person in charge of the endeavor.

Objective

  • It was meant to ease the process of mail sorting and delivery in a country where different places, often, have the same or similar names, and letters are written in a wide variety of languages.

How does the PIN code work?

  • Six digits make up the PIN.
  • Northern, Eastern, Western, and Southern postal regions are denoted by the first number, whereas the Army Postal Service is denoted by the number 9.
  • A subregion is indicated by the second number, and the sorting district is indicated by the third number.
  • The remaining data further reduces the geographic scope to the precise delivery post office.

Global Scenario

  • Globally, the US Postal Service's Nationwide Improved Mail Service plan, which was created to increase the speed of mail delivery, saw the introduction of the Zone Improvement Plan (ZIP) code on July 1, 1963.
  • In the UK, automated mail sorting first appeared in the middle of the 1960s.
  • An alphanumeric postal code that allows for machine sorting at every level of handling, including the carrier's delivery route, is the key to mechanization.
  • In July 1968, Japan established its postal code address system, and the country's main post offices now have automatic postal code reader-sorters.

Source: The Indian Express


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