Cawnpex 2016 - District level philatelic exhibition, Kanpur

Cawnpex 2016

- A Report by Aditya Asthana

A two day district level philatelic exhibition,“Cawnpex 2016”was organized by India Post from 16^th – 17^th December, 2016. The name “Cawnpex“was inspired by the erstwhile spelling of the city - Cawnpore. The postal department branded the exhibition with a special logo of the event, featuring a picture of the current Kanpur G.P.O building. In 2015, the district level exhibition held at Kanpur was named Kanpex 2015 but Henceforth the event would be called Cawnpex. The Exhibition had 56 frames in Competitive class and 2 in Invitee class. Mr. Dinesh Chandra Sharma and Mr. Arun Agarwal were the members of the jury at the event. The exhibition took place at the Kanpur Philatelic Bureau which is situated at the second floor of the GPO building.

3 special covers were released during the exhibition. On December 16^th, the exhibition was inaugurated by PMG Mr. Alok Saxena and a special cover dedicating the flag song (Vijayi vishwa tiranga pyara, Jhanda uncha rahe hamara...') written by Shyam Lal Gupta Parshad, a popular writer from Kanpur, was released. The special cover features the image of the original notes of the writer (source: Bithoor Museum) and the cancellation features a flag. A painting competition was also organized for the school children.

On  December 17^th, two special covers were released. A cover featuring a quotation by Mahatma Gandhi, “Everyone must be his own scavenger” was released on “Swatchh Bharat”. The cancellation of the cover  features spectacles of Gandhi (Swatchh Bharat logo). Another cover featuring the pictures of Cawnpore Kotwali, Radha Krishna (J.K.) Temple and a proposed Kanpur metro train with caption “Kanpur Kal, Aaj Aur Kal” was also released. The cancellation of the cover features  Kanpur GPO building.

The award ceremony was chaired by Prof. Indranil Manna, Director of IIT Kanpur. All participants were honored with medals and certificates.

Award List

Aditya Asthana -  “Postal History of Cawnpore” Gold + Best Exhibit Trophy (Senior)

Sidak Singh Saluja –“Brave Sikhs in Defense” - Silver + Best Exhibit trophy ( Junior)

Dipak Gupta – “Innovative stamps” of Bhutan - Gold

Rajpreet Singh Saluja - “Sikhism – It’s Glory and Heritage” - Gold

Mrs. Nupur Mehrotra - Indian Postal Stationery – Gold

Winners : L to R: Sidak Singh, Aditya Asthana, Rajpreet Singh Saluja, D.D.Shukla, Dipak Gupta, Vishal Yadav

Kanpur Philatelists' meet 

 Pic 1 : D.D. Shukla, Arjun Ghosh,  Rajpreet Singh Saluja, Arun Agrawal
Pic 2 : Aditya Asthana, RS Saluja, Dipak Gupta &  Ramesh Chandra