KARACHI, Feb 23: The Pakistan Post Office has decided to build a postal mall in the city modelled on the one already operating in the capital.
A high-ranking official of the postal utility told Dawn on Saturday that the postal mall would offer the services of express post, Airex, Internet, sale of commemorative stamps and transfer of money (remittances). He added that in addition the postal mall would offer all those services available at general post offices.
Official sources said that the PPO would soon receive motorcycles from the Universal Postal Union. They added that apart from other third-world countries, Pakistan had also requested the international postal organization to give it 160 motorcycles so that some beats — areas covered by postmen — could be motorized.
At present, no postman in Karachi has been given a cycle, let alone a motorcycle. The postmen receive Rs60 as a cycle allowance every month if they own a cycle. In addition, the PPO recruits only those candidates as postmen who know how to ride a cycle.
The sources said that the motorcycles would be insured and the postmen using them would be given a maintenance allowance for the upkeep of the vehicles.
The deputy postmaster general, Fazli Sattar Khan, explained that under another scheme the PPO might give motorcycles to postmen.
He said: “As implemented in Islamabad, Lahore and Peshawar, the scheme envisages the transfer of motorcycles’ ownership to the postmen over a certain period of time. A certain amount of money would be deducted from the salary of the postman on a monthly basis. In a period of six to seven years, the postmen would own the motorcycle given to them.” He added that the PPO would also give a petrol allowance to the postmen who get the motorcycles.
The divisional superintendent of the postal services, Karachi, Sherin Zaman, told Dawn that the PPO had made a plan to combine postal beats in such a way that the motorcycles proved to be of maximum utility. “New localities — such as Gulistan-i-Jauhar, and the stretch of land from Sohrab Goth to Donba Goth — will be single beats. But in areas like New Town, Gulshan-i-Iqbal, Orangi, North Nazimabad the PPO has combined beats,” he said.
Mr Zaman explained that a postman with a motorcycle would be of little utility in areas like Tower and I.I Chundrigar Road. “Highrises dot the landscape of these areas and a conventional postman with a cycle would be of as utility as a postman with a motorcycle.”
He said that previously under the PPO rules a postman had to cover a distance of at least 10 miles every day. “But the distance was reduced to seven miles afterwards. In reality, however, a postman covers a distance of 12 to 16 kilometres on average,” he said.