The central hall at New Delhi's historic telegraph office is witnessing a sudden buzz, as Indians are rushing in to be part of history by sending their last telegrams before the government shuts down the 160-year-old service from Monday, following an onslaught of new and cheaper modes of communication.
Known as "Taar" in Hindi, telegrams have been both anticipated and dreaded for bringing good and bad, but always urgent news to people since the 1850s.
India's decision to shut down its historic telegraph service in the face of dwindling revenues will come into effect from July 15. The last telegram will be sent out at 10 p.m. on July 14.
A huge loss was being incurred due to the decline in the usage of telegrams over the years as mobile phones, short service messages and e-mails took over.
"In running this service, the working expenses were too high. Telegram charges for 30 words are 25 rupees. While sending an SMS is very cheap. People stopped using the telegram service," said Central Telegraph Office General Manager Shamim Akhtar.
From the heady days of more than half a million telegrams per day in 1985, the number of daily telegrams has dropped to a mere 5,000 per day - making it unfeasible for the government to sustain the costs and staff needed to run the service efficiently.
As time passed and technology advanced, the government's telegraph department had to slowly downsize operations, shut various offices and transfer its employees several times to other departments.
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Now, there are only four telegram offices operating in New Delhi with only around 250 people working in the central office.
The employees, who still hoped that court would pass a stay order on account of petitions filed by some people, could not come to terms with the news that a place where they had worked for decades would become a part of the history.
In the early days, telegraphists would type in Morse Code. Now, they use computers. Messages varied from mundane subjects, to family tragedies, to notes about major news events, all typed with the same hands. It is how the office's staff stayed informed about what was happening around the world.
Once the service is disbanded, the workers will be moved to other communication departments. Some are emotional about the closure and feel they are too old to begin something new.
"The telegram is very important. Mobile networks do not work at many places and there are no landlines there either. So, telegrams work in those places. The telegram is 160-years-old and has been in operation ever since the time of the British rule. People need to give copies in court, give permission to anybody, to grant leave or for marriage or death intimation. It will be a problem now for the public. This is for the service of the public and even if there was no profit the department was working on no-profit and no-loss," said Rohtash Verma, telegraph department employee.
In the recent years, the main telegram senders were limited mainly to government organisations, except for a few people who remained faithfully associated with the age-old services.
But now, people from all walks of life have been pouring into the telegram office to keep their own slice of history by sending their last telegram to keep as mementos.
"We just got the news that it is going to be closed. So we just feel that something which you had be knowing and maybe even if you were not using you knew was there and it was there if you needed it and you can use it whenever you require it. But, technology is advancing now," said Sangeeta Pasi, a customer who had come to send her last telegrams.
Over the years, the state owned telecom had made several technical upgrades in the telegraph service, the latest was the introduction of a web-based messaging system in 2010.