With football fever gripping the city in the wake of the FIFA World Cup, the Department of Posts in association with the Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation Ltd. (BMRCL) has decided to cash in by organising a philately exhibition on the beautiful game.
The exhibition, which was inaugurated on Thursday, attracted scores of young football enthusiasts. The exhibition has 20 frames of stamps on various sports and has 10 frames exclusively dedicated to football. Besides stamps on football, the exhibition also has quotations and huge posters of popular football players.
The stamps have football stadium designs, different types of kicks and football trophies among others. Purvank Shah, a class ten student of KLE Society School who seemed thrilled observing every minute detail at the exhibition, said: “I loved the stamps, posters and quotations that are on display. The fact that there are so many stamps on football from several countries speaks volumes about the popularity of the game.”
Mahesh Jambulingam, president, Karnataka Philatelic Society, said stamps from across the globe were on display at the exhibition. He said the oldest World Cup stamp was of Chile, dated 1962. He also said India had woken up rather late to football but appreciated the efforts of the Department of Posts for having brought out commemorative stamps for football this year.
The department has planned to release a special cover on July 14, a day after the FIFA finals which is scheduled on July 13. The exhibition will be held till July 20 at Vismaya Hall at the M.G. Road metro station.