Ancient Letters from Israel

Hi ! I have already spent about a week in Kullu & just gettig familiar to this new place. In last seven days I found Kullu a big place like any other city. Today I visited Manali, another famous tourist spot of Himachal Pradesh. It's about 90 minutes drive from Kullu. The way to Manali is really a picturesque view alongwith the Beas river. After visiting various places of Himachal Pradesh, I just can say that whole Himacal Pradesh is full of natural beauty. To see its beauty, you must have lot of stamina to travel along steepy, Zig zag roads and a bit adventurous too, to go through some risky and dangerous path. This is all what I observed during lot of travelling in different parts of Himachal Pradesh. Coming back to philatelic items in today's Post, Here are three beautiful stamps which will be issued by Israel on 17 Decmber 2008 . The three stamps in this depict examples of ancient letters discovered at archeological sites that shed light on important chapters in the history of Eretz Israel. Each of the letters presents significant historical evidence regarding a tumultuous time in the history of Eretz Israel and demonstrates the different writing methods and letter formats utilized in various periods.Rulers employed special messengers to deliver letters to their recipients. The first day cover which is not shown here depicts one such Egyptian messenger, as detailed in an ancient Egyptian wall painting. In our regular series some nice FDCs of se-tenant stamps from the collection of Mr. Shrikant Parikh. This is all for the Day ! ...Till Next Post ..... Have a Great Time!.....

A Journey to Indian Stamps - FDCs of se-tenant stamps

From Collection of Shrikant Parikh

National Parks of India - 31 May 2008

Ist War of Independence 1857 - 9 August 2007

Club News

Honour for Father & Son

It is a pleasure to write here that Mr. Pradip Jain and his son Pragya Kothari, both were awarded Vermeil medals for their exhibits in ISRAEL-2008 recently held at Tel Aviv. The name of Mr. Pradeep Jain is a well known name in philately and he has already won a large number of National and International awards . But the effort of Pragya is highly appreciated which made him to achieve this International award at a very young age. He was the youngest participant from India. As it is very difficult for a young philatelist to win a higher award during the transition period when he/she enters the senior class from youth class. Pragya has well presented his both the exhibits. Especially his one frame exhibit 'Man measures his Environment" is to be mentioned here. In this exhibit he presented the abstract topic of Measurement related with Physics in a very interesting way that could be understood by a common man. His comprehensive exhibit through various philatelic items shows his thorough study on the subject and hunt for appropriate philatelic items . He has proved that preparing a good Thematic Exhibit is not an easy task. He has sent scans of all 16 pages of his exhibit. Its a wonderful exhibit prepared by him.I wish I could show here all his pages for you to view but it is not possible.I am giving here some of them. We wish this young achiever a great success in his academic as well as philatelic career. Pragya is a student of 3rd year Economics Honors at Delhi University.

Pragya writes .......

This one frame collection was started as a result of my interest in the field of Physics especially measurement. I started this collection by the end of year 2003.

The topic man measures his environment was selected after long discussion with my father, who is also my mentor in the field of Philately. What made me stick to this topic was the fact that here I do not include measurement as a whole rather

focus on ways in which human beings try to measure different elements of environment. To contain this topic into a single frame criterion was in fact a real big challenge.

I have written here few days back about cancellations on Sai Baba issue given by same post office. Here is another instance of cancellations in two differernt dates/years sent by our distinguished member Mr. Shrikant Parikh. The dates are quite interesting all 9s and I am so pleased to present it here as it is also my favourite number.

Shrikant Parikh writes from Ahmedabad......

This has furtherence to your Club News of 11th June,2008 showing cancellation in two different sizes by the same post-office. This led me to put my hands on an interesting set of FDCs having cancellation in two different dates/years by the same post-office. Kalki Krishnamurthy - 300p stamp issued on 9.9.1999

FDC # 1 : normal date cancellation 9.9.99

FDC # 2 : with extra 9 .................9.9.999 !?!?

Indian Participation in World stamp Championship Israel - 2008
- Report by Ajay Kumar Mittal, National Commissioner

World Stamp Championship ISRAEL-2008 held at Tel Aviv, Israel during May 14-21, 2008 and was organized by the Israel Philatelic Federation in cooperation with the Israel Post Ltd. and its Philatelic Service under the patronage of Federation Internationale de Philatelie - FIP. It was 2nd time when a World Stamp Championship was organized. First time it was held in Singapore.

The International Jury, Israel-2008

There were 27 entries in WSC class out of which 6 entries were short listed for voting by the Jury members and finally Mr. Luis Alemany of Spain was voted as 2nd World Stamp Champion for his collection “Brazil Bulls Eye”. Mr. Saverio Imperato of Italy was voted first runner up for his collection ‘Tuscany’ and Mr. Joseph Hackmey of Great Britain was 2nd runner up for his collection ‘Classic Persia’. Grand Prix d’ Honneur was given to Mr. Joseph Hackmey of Great Britain for his collection ‘France First Issue’.
The Children corner of the exhibition was always full of enthusiasm and thousands of children of all ages attended the painting and quiz competitions. Quiz competitions were well organized with help of multimedia presentation on regular intervals on all the days. These programmes were supported with lots of gifts and prizes.

National Commissioners, Israel - 2008

Two seminars were organised Aiming at the potential Jurors and those Jurors who are interested in cross-accreditation in Philatelic Literature and Thematic Philately. Mr. Francis Kiddle gave presentation on Society Journals and FIP Judgements and Mr. Bernard Jimenez gave presentation on Thematic Philately: Judging methodology and Jurors/exhibitors education. Nicos Rangos of Cyprus gave his presentation on present FIP Guidelines for Judging Maximaphily exhibits. All of the above seminars were well attended by philatelists.

From India 28 entries were applied for participation in this exhibition. Out of those the exhibition authorities accepted 17 entries. Later on 2 exhibitors withdrew their entries due to their own reasons. Finally Indian participation in the above exhibition was 15. There were 5 entries in Traditional Class, 2 entries in thematic, 1 in revenue, 6 in Literature class and 1 entry in one frame exhibit class.

Special Award by Philatelic Congress of India

Two entries were transferred to Special Studies Class from traditional class by the Jury. One entry of literature class was judged ‘Out of Date’ as year of publication mentioned in the book was 2002. Another entry of Literature class ‘Stamps Today’ was adjudged incomplete entry as they received incomplete volume of his magazine. Final result on Indian participation was 2 Large Vermeil Medals, 6 Vermeil Medals, 2 Silver Medals and 1 Silver Bronze Medal. A Special Award by Philatelic Congress of India which was Awarded to Mr. Santiago Cruz of Colombia on his collection of Aerophilately titled ‘The Valiente Scadta issue’. Mr. Ajeet Singhee, Vice President Philatelic Congress of India was appointed as Jury from India. Past President of PCI Mr. M.G. Pittie was appointed as the Jury from Israel Quota of Jury and was also appointed as the Vice President of Jury Committee.
These World Exhibitions are best place for exposure to modern International trends in Philately and dissemination of knowledge. The exhibition was a great success.
The detailed result of Indian participation is given below:
First Name
Surname
Class
Title
Frames Allotted
Result
Marks

Ajay Kumar
Mittal
Traditional
Indore
8
Large Vermeil
88

Dhananjay
Desai
Traditional
Soruth (Indian Feudatory State) 1790-1950
8
Large Vermeil
88

Rajan
Jayakar
Revenue
Calcutta Court of Small Causes 1869-1875
5
Vermeil
82

Dinesh Chandra
Sharma
Thematic
Summer Olympic Games
5
Vermeil
82

Pragya
Kothari
One Frame
Man Measures His Environment
1
Vermeil
81

Suketu S.
Jhaveri
Traditional
Indian Telegraphs 1851-1914
5
Vermeil
80

Pradip
Jain
Special Study
My Life is My Message - Mahatma Gandhi
5
Vermeil
80

Pragya
Kothari
Thematic
Grey Goose Wings
5
Vermeil
80

Dinesh Chandra
Sharma
Literature
The History of Olympic Games through Philately
Lit.
Silver
71

Ravi
Bhansali
Special Study
Modifications
5
Silver
70

Surendra
Kotadia
Literature
Indian Inland Post Cards with Advertisement and Slogans
Lit.
Silver Bronze
65
Combined
Surendra
Kotadia
Literature
Indian Airmail Letter Card With Advertisement and Slogans 2007
Lit.