The "Night Air Mail Service" was introduced on 30th January 1949 by the then Communication Minister, Mr. Rafi Ahmed Kidwai, to rehabilitate the deteriorating postal service. When the Railway Mail Service and Motor Mail Service had reached saturation point, the only option left was to introduce Air Mail Service for the First Class Mail. As day time air service were running with full loads, night air service were planned. Before this period, night flying was not safe in the absence of security measures and equipment at Airports. The Night Air Mail scheme was an experiment towards night flying in India and for the introduction of the "All Up Scheme". Initially only mail was transported on N. A. S.

Under the N.A.S., the 4 principal cities of Bombay, Calcutta, Madras and New Delhi, which are in 4 different corners of India, were linked with Nagpur. 4 night planes will leave, one each from these cities, for Nagpur, with a mail load from their region and will return to their home base in the early morning, after exchanging the mail at Nagpur.

The fight schedule was as follows as per Postal Notice No.65 dated 27.1.1949:

In connection with introduction of this service there have been considerable changes in the hours of clearance of Letter Boxes, despatches and deliveries of mails etc. Officers in charge of Post Officces and R.M.S., offices should personally see to it that their office records are kept corrected upto date and that correct information is furnished to the public in connection with any enquiries that may be made. The revised hours should be notified to the public on the office Notice Boards, Letter boxes etc. Care should be taken to see that proper hours types are used in the date-stamps supplied to the delivery and sorting branches and that all Letter Boxes are invariably cleared fully and punctually.

It is also necessary to ensure that the sorting establishment is thoroughly acquainted with he revised sorting orders that have been issued in connection with the Night Air Mail Service. The Director General expects that each Postmaster, Record Clerk and Head Sorter will ensure that his staff is thoroughly acquainted with the revised routing arrangements. Any discrepancy which may be noticed should be reported immediately to the controlling officer.

The initial period of the licence was for 3 months and the special features was permission to carry passengers together with mail and freight, because by now the night routes were fairly well covered by night flying facilities. Safety conditions were reinforced by equipping various aerodromes for emergency landings. The night air fare was lower than the day time air fare. On the Calcutta - Bombay route it was Rs.172/- instead of Rs.205/- and on the Madras - Delhi route it was Rs.191/- instead of Rs.220/-.

The N.A.S., was reintroduced on 1st April 1975 between Madras and Bombay, but it did not last long. And since then, many times the IAC have restarted the N.A.S., but with similar results.

Sometime in November 1983, Vayudoot, the third airline of India, has assured the P & T Department that N.A.S., would be resumed on all sectors as before, but they wanted an assurance from the Postal Department that the minimum load of mail would be 4,500kgs., per flight. However, it appears that the deal did not click until 1986 when on the 2nd June the N.A.S., was finally resumed in the Delhi-Nagpur and Bombay-Nagpur sectors. The Delhi - Nagpur service touched Jaipur in both directions. On 10th June 1986 the Calcutta - Nagpur and Madras - Nagpur sectors were also reopened. Details of such flights are not known.

When Domestic Speed Post is introduced in India on and from 1st august 1986, the services of N.A.S., were sought, but as the schedule of Vayudoot flights was not reliable, the Postal Department did not switch over to Vayudoot N.A.S. Now it is understood that N.A.S., has again been suspended from June 1987.

Now, we should deal with cachet and cancellation pertaining to this service. A special Duplex Cancellation reading ?NIGHT MAIL / FIRST FLIGHT? and ?NAGPUR / 30.1.49 / AIR? in round circle was used on the inaugural day of the N.A.S., from Nagpur only. A special Supplementary Cachet was also used which reads ?INLAND NIGHT AIR MAIL / INAUGURATION / JANUARY 30, 1949?.

Besides the above, no special postmarks were used on Night Airmail and it very hard to tell whether a particular article had travelled by N.A.S. But evidences die hard. There are covers which speek by itself that they must have travelled by N.A.S., or otherwise they would not have reached the destination, the next day. My first example is from Calcutta to Jaipur city.

The functioning of N.A.S., can be proved authentically only by a few Crash Covers from the different region involved. For example, I have mail from Bombay, Delhi, Jamnagar, Jodhpur, Nagpur, Madras, and Tumsar (near Nagpur), which were involve in a N.A.S., crash near Calcutta on 21st November 1951. If the N.A.S., was not working in the fashion I have described above, it was just impossible for mail of different cities (which are apart by thousands of miles) being involved in one air crash. These Crash Covers are scarce and are hard to find today.

Now I will give details of N.A.S., crashes. The first disaster took place in the morning of 21st November 1951 near Calcutta, when a DC-3 Dakota of Deccan Airways coming from Nagpur struck a grove of coconut. 16 people out of 17, including the crew were killed. Only a small quantity of mail was salvaged. A 2 line cachet reading ?SALVAGED NIGHT AIRMAIL / DUM DUM CRASH 21ST NOV 51.? in a rectangular box was applied on such mail. As the first ?M? in Dum Dum was found to be missing, a new stamp was prepared, this time without the rectangular box. Examples are as under.

Another example is from Jamnagar dated 20th November. It was posted at about 11AM. It appears that it was sent to Bombay - Jamnagar daily flight via Bhavnagar and Rajkot, as the All up Air Scheme was in vogue. Then, on reaching Bombay it was sent to Nagpur via N.A.S., where it was loaded on to the Calcutta bound N.A.S. 20th / 21st flight which was involved in the crash.

Next example is from Jodhpur dated 19th November. It came to Delhi via Delhi - Jodhpur by daily flight via Jaipur and was loaded on N.A.S., on the 20th from Palam for Nagpur, so that it could be loaded on the Calcutta bound N.A.S.

My one more example is from Tumsar, a place near Nagpur. It seems that it must have come to Nagpur by train, then loaded on to the Calcutta bound N.A.S.

My last example from Madras was reached to Nagpur by N.A.S., then, it was sent to Calcutta bound N.A.S.

The 2nd crash occurred on 12th December 1953 near Nagpur airport after the plane had taken off for Madras. The salvaged mail was hand-stamped ?SALVAGED MAILS / N.A.S. Air Crash / Nagpur dated 12-12-53.?, which appears in 3 line without box.

My first example is from Calcutta. It was posted from Kalighat PO on 11.12.53 for Pondicherry, flown to Nagpur on the 11th N.A.S., and thus loaded on the ill-fated plane to complete its journey via Madras.

My second example is from New Delhi. It was posted from New Delhi-1 on 11.12.53 for Pondicherry, flown to Nagpur by N.A.S., the same evening and thus got into Madras bound N.A.S.

My third example is a registered envelope from Bombay. It was posted from Girgam, Bombay-4 on 11.12.1953 at about 3 PM. The address portion of the said letter is burnt off.

My fourth example is from Patna RMS, posted at about 8.30 AM on 10.12.1953 for Pondicherry. It must have travelled by train to reach Delhi next day, to catch the Nagpur bound N.A.S.

The third crash also occurred at Nagpur in the morning of the 2nd February 1955, when an Indian Airlines Corporation - Dakotas crashed while taking off for Delhi, killing all ten occupants. The salvaged mail received a hand-stamp in 3 lines which reads as follows:

My first example is a Post Card mailed on 1 FEB 55 from Bombay to Buxar, Arrah - Bihar, which reached Nagpur via Bombay / Nagpur N.A.S., and then it was leaving for Delhi. And involved in plane crash near Nagpur.

Before going to fourth N.A.S., crash, I must admit and apologize for the wrong information (I do not know how it crept in) stating that the ?said air craft was Calcutta bound in my previous article on ?Night Air Mail? , which was published in January - March 1988 issue of India Post - the journal of the India Study Circle for Philately?.

The fourth and last N.A.S., crash occurred on 12th September 1963 when the I.A.C.?s Viscount plane exploded in midair near Agra, killing all passengers and crew. It was on a scheduled night flight from Nagpur to Delhi. It was reported that much of the mail was burnt, but a few items were salvaged and handed over to the Senior Superintendent of Post Offices, Agra. The salvaged mails received a hand stamp in two lines which reads as follows

My above two examples [i] posted to Calcutta-13 [ii] New Delhi are showing that the Department has sent the salvaged (burnt) mails to its respective recipient through their Departmental envelopes only, so that the salvaged articles reached at its destination without further damages.