For a generation growing up on emails and SMSes, the telegram will just be one of those things in the history of telecommunication that you read about. But for those who've known the pain and pleasure of receiving and dispatching news - happy or sad - through the telegram, the discontinuation of the 160 year old service in India from tomorrow has brought back lots of memories. As Anil Rastogi, the Daddaji from Na Bole Tum... Na Maine Kuch Kaha, remembers, "The process of sending a telegram would give us a different high altogether. Standing in the long queue and filling the form...iss sab mein ek alag maza tha.
Also, since every word in a telegram counted, woh crisp format likhna, it was a thrill in itself."
Malini Awasthi, singer and folk artiste, says the surprise element made telegrams the most welcome and dreaded piece of communication. "I had recieved maximum telegrams when I passed my Class X Boards with flying colours. One of my uncles even sent a money order with the telegram! There always used to be a surprise element when the postman used to shout, 'Telegram aaya hai'. The blood pressure of the entire colony would fluctuate ki kya likha hoga usme!"
"There existed a whole 'taar waala community' who would bring these telegrams to our houses and we would give them special baqshish on various occasions so that they would deliver the telegrams on time," reminisceses Vishan Prakash, businessman, "Since a telegram was supposed to be written in a crisp manner, framing a telegram according to the money we had, was fun!"
Sorry for the typos
But the communication wasn't without its share of bloopers. Kiron Chopra, who owes the success of his export business to telegrams - "I would communicate with my clients via telegrams only," he says - recalls a particular instance when a typo in a telegram really upset his overseas client. "I was going abroad to visit one of my clients. So, I sent him a telegram informing him about my visit. But instead of writing 'I am coming', the post office staff wrote 'U are coming'. The client got very offended and immediately sent back a telegram saying that he had no plans of visiting India. I had a lot of explaining to do because of the error," says Chopra.
Corporate head honcho, Jayant Krishna narrates a similar incident. "I still remember this time when I received a telegram from a company, which was signed at the end as 'Without regards' instead of 'With regards'. When I asked the company what this was about, they explained that the boss had asked them to send every telegram without 'regards' as a cost cutting measure, but the secretary actually thought he meant that every telegram should be undersigned 'without regards'! It was really funny how people used to make all the effort to reduce the word count while sending telegrams," recounts Jayant.
Better late than never?
Considered to be the fastest mode of communication at one time, many telegrams never did reach their destination when they were intended to. "I remember I once sent a telegram to my family while I was in Bhopal, that I will be coming to Lucknow on a particular date. During those times, telegrams often reached late. And as luck would have it, my family didn't get the telegram till after I had reached home! I received my own telegram," tells Nawab Mir Jafar Abdullah.
For keepsake
Like Javed Akhtar, a lot of people are sending telegrams to their loved ones as keepsakes. Seema Rajbir, who's preserved all the birthday greetings she received through telegrams in her hey days, shares, "My husband has sent me a romantic telegram for our 25th wedding anniversary, which we celebrate this year."
Javed sends telegrams, Shabana tweets
As a sort of keepsake, Javed Akhtar has sent telegrams to his grandchildren. "Javed just sent his last telegrams to both grandchildren. Hope they will treasure them. Pure nostalgia for us and some sadness," Shabana Azmi tweeted a few days ago.
For social impact
Just days before the telegram service shuts down for good, Kunal sent a telegram to the Minister of Health and Family Welfare Ghulam Nabi Azad as part of Humane Society International India's (HSI) Be Cruelty-Free Campaign, saying, "Honourable Minister, I am so proud that India has banned the cruel and unnecessary practice of testing cosmetics on live animals. However, if we don't allow such cruelty in our laboratories, we should not allow it on our shop shelves either. Please make India a cruelty-free cosmetics zone with an import ban on animal-tested cosmetics."
PILs filed
On Thursday, the Madras High Court issued a notice to the Ministry of Telecommunication and Bharat Sanchar Nigam limited (BSNL) on two PILs that sought restoration and continuance of the telegram service in India. The petitioners contended that the BSNL didn't consider the rural masses before scrapping the telegram service.
Robert Chandrakumar, a Madurai-based advocate, claimed that 70% of India's population lived in the rural areas where communication through mobile phones and email had not reached. In another petition, M Sekaran, president of Federation of Consumer and Service Organisations in Tiruchi, alleged that the BSNL gave 'step motherly treatment' to the telegram service before scrapping it. The verdict in the cases has been deferred.
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