2018-03-09 Fri

Indo-Iran relations are marked by a meaningful interaction held recently in the month of February. To seal the deal, India Post has issued a set of 2 stamps and a miniature sheet featuring two important ports of both the countries.

This is not the first time that India and Iran have joined philatelic bond. However, the previous joint issue simply aimed at the cultural exchange whereas the recent issue speaks more of a political language. India and Iran have signed a significant pact which gives New Delhi an operational control of a part of the strategically located Chabahar Port on the Gulf of Oman for 18 months.

The port of Chabahar is located in southeastern Iran in the Gulf of Oman. It is the only Iranian port with direct access to the ocean. The port will make way for India to bypass Pakistan in transporting goods to Afghanistan using a sea-land route with the objective to increase trade connectivity between major cities such as Mumbai, Moscow, Tehran, Baku, Astrakhan etc.

As the theme of the joint issue is “Trade and Commerce Connectivity”, the joint issue features important ports of the countries. The other stamp in the joint issue features Kandla port, or the Deendayal Port in Gujarat. The stamps come with the value of Rs. 5 and Rs. 25 depicting Iranian and Indian port respectively.

The previous Indo-Iranian joint issue that was released in 2004 featured the famous poets Kabir and Hafez of India and Iran respectively.

Image Curtsey: http://rainbowstampclub.blogspot.in