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Polity & Governance
Mahesh

18/12/23 12:01 PM IST

Post Office Bill, 2023

In News
  • After being passed in the Rajya Sabha, the Post Office Bill, 2023, was brought to the Lok Sabha for consideration on Wednesday (December 13). Seeking to repeal the 125-year-old Indian Post Office Act of 1898.
Provisions of the bill
  • The Bill aims to “consolidate and amend the law relating to Post Office in India,” which today provides many services beyond simply mail delivery, the primary concern of the Indian Post Office Act of 1898.
  • The Post Office network today has become a vehicle for delivery of different citizen-centric services, which necessitated the repeal enactment of a new law, the Bill states.
  • Section 9 of the Bill allows the Centre to, by notification, empower any officer to “intercept, open or detain any item” in the interest of state security, friendly relations with foreign states, public order, emergency, public safety, or contravention of other laws.
  • This provision also allows post officers to hand over postal items to customs authorities if they are suspected to contain any prohibited item, or if such items are liable to duty.
  • This is similar to Sections 19, 25, and 26 of the 1898 Act.
  • Section 19(1) disallowed persons from sending by post “any explosive, dangerous, filthy, noxious or deleterious substance, any sharp instrument not properly protected, or any living creature which is either noxious or likely to injure postal articles” or postal service officers in the course of transmission.
  • The power to intercept any prohibited or restricted articles during transmission by post, or any postal article for public good during emergency or in the interest of public safety could also be exercised by the government and its officials under Sections 25 and 26 of the 1898 Act.
  • The Law Commission in 1968, while examining the 1898 Act, observed that the term emergency is not explicitly defined, thereby allowing significant discretion while intercepting goods.
Exemption from liability
  • Section 10 exempts the Post Office and its officer from “any liability by reason of any loss, mis-delivery, delay, or damage in course of any service provided by the Post Office,” except such liability as may be prescribed.
  • The 1898 Act too exempted the government from liability for any lapses in postal service, except where such liability was undertaken expressly.
  • Moreover, the 2023 Bill removes all penalties and offences under the 1898 Act. For example, offences committed by post office officials such as misconduct, fraud, and theft, among others, have been deleted entirely.
  • At the same time, if anyone refuses or neglects to pay the charges for availing a service provided by the Post Office, such amount shall be recoverable “as if it were an arrear of land revenue due” from them.
Centre's exclusivity
  • The present Bill has removed Section 4 of the 1898 Act, which allowed the Centre the exclusive privilege of conveying by post, from one place to another, all letters.
  • Effectively, this exclusivity was already lost by the 1980s, with the rise of private courier services.
  • Since neither the Post Office Act of 1898 nor the Indian Post Office Rules, 1933 had defined the term “letter” anywhere, courier services bypassed the 1898 law by simply calling their couriers “documents” and “parcels”, rather than “letters.”
  • The 2023 Bill, for the first time, regulates private courier services by bringing it under its ambit.
Concerns
  • The Bill retains its draconian and colonial provisions, that too while eliminating the burden of accountability which a governmental enterprise like India Post ought constitutionally to shoulder. Sadly, it offers no new ideas to bring our post offices into the 21st Century.
Source- Indian Express

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