PANAJI
Dr M R Ramesh Kumar, president, Goa Philately and Numismatics Society (GPNS) while paying a philatelic pictorial tribute to St Francis Xavier points out that even though the Portuguese India stamps got printed from 1871, the stamps of St Francis Xavier were first printed in 1931.
Dr Ramesh Kumar who has rare stamps in his collection shares, “A set of six stamps were printed, which included Cassock, SFX arrival in Goa, Basilica of Bom Jesus and the Tomb. The second time the SFX stamp was printed in 1946 as part of the tribute to the ‘Historical’ men of India, and later in 1948 as part of ‘Great’ men in India.”
On October 25, 1952, to commemorate the 4th death centenary, three stamps were issued “ that of the statue, the miraculous arm and the Tomb. A set of three postcards were issued on SFX with the above-mentioned stamps. Also, several types of Airmails were printed. Another cover dates back to December 4, 1952, when the first philatelic exhibition ‘Exposiciao Filatelica “ Goa 1952’ was held in Goa, states Dr Ramesh Kumar, a former scientist at the National Institute of Oceanography, Dona Paula.
“A special cancellation on SFX exposition was made by our GPNS member, S N Prabhu for the 1984 SFX Exposition held at Velha, Old Goa. This has both Devanagari and English scripts for the Cancellation and ‘Give the world Jesus’ in Konkani, Devanagari and English and a cachet of SFX on the cover. An FDC on the SFX was issued by the Department of Posts on December 24, 1974. A Special cover on SFX was released on December 21, 2014, during the GOAPEX 2014 held at ESG at Panaji,” informs the GPNS president.
Also included in his pictorial tribute is a recently released stamp on Basilica of Bom Jesus as part of a set of five commemorative postage stamps and a miniature sheet on UNESCO World Heritage Sites in India on August 15, 2020, at the occasion of 74th Independence Day. The cover has the Basilica of Bom Jesus stamp and also the recently released Permanent Pictorial cancellation of the Basilica, which was done on October 9, 2020, by the Department of Posts, Goa Postal Division, Goa on World Post Day.
