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Part 70, Issue # 159 - March 11, 2004
By Dr Avinash B
Jagtap
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After having spent about five months in India I came back to Switzerland. During
my stay I had an occasion to meet budding philatelists, school boys and girls in
Viman Nagar Air force High School in Pune. Here relatively large scale
philatelic displays were organized by Mrs Parab, the Principal of the school and
I was invited as a Jury. The enthusiasm of the children was enormous. I
remembered my childhood days! I had helped many of these children to build their
own thematic collections and arrange their displays. I felt that my help did
produce results.
I also had an occasion to meet and consult elderly philatelists, who had already
displayed at district and national levels and they expressed their wish that I
may give them some fruitful ideas and tell them some thing new from the
philatelic world in Europe. One of the philatelists had asked me to bring some
philatelic materials, which could add substantially to his collection and enable
him to get higher awards. So I had with me besides stamps, also stamp booklets,
miniature sheets, postal stationery, maximum cards, etc. Some items I had were
from Czechoslovakia and Germany, as my friends from this part had given me to
show to my friend. To my great surprise my philatelic friend flatly refused to
accept the so-called Picture Cards ("Bildkarten" in German), which had been
officially sold by many European Countries, like Austria, Germany, Switzerland,
Czechoslovakia, Belgium etc) where the lefthand half of a post card is printed
with a colorful photograph of places.
I have no idea how the judges or juries at the exhibitions in India are trained,
if they have to undergo certain "examinations" or tests and how badly it could
influence the performance of enthusiastic exhibitors at home and at the
international level. I am sure many Indian exhibitors must have gone through
experiences, which would have marred their interest in exhibiting their
displays. I feel there should be written regulations, regarding the way how a
thematic exhibit is to be evaluated, what materials can be exhibited and which
others should not be shown, what are the "model" procedures of exhibiting, the
space devoted for write up, etc.
I expect that many thematic collectors will surely like to know what is wrong
with our judges and juries at the philatelic exhibitions.
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