PPCs: Permanent Pictorial Cancellations
A PPC is a postmark with a picture, used permanently at one post office: a monument, an animal or a festival from that place. Collecting them is a fun thing to do when you travel: stop at the post office, get the cancellation on a postcard or cover, and keep it as a memory of the trip. Find the post offices on the map, or collect them by post.
1 PPC post office on the map Locations: India Post’s pincode directory. Some pins mark only the PIN area.
What do GPO, HO, SO and BO mean?
The letters after a post office’s name are its type in India Post’s network. GPO, HO, SO and BO go from the biggest office to the smallest.
- GPO
- General Post Office: the main post office of a large city.
- HO
- Head Post Office: the main office of a postal division; the sub offices around it report to it.
- SO
- Sub Post Office: a town or neighbourhood post office, under a head office.
- BO
- Branch Post Office: a small village office under a sub office, often open only a few hours a day.
- PB
- Philatelic Bureau: the stamp collectors’ counter at a head office.
- NA
- No longer active: the office is closed or merged with another.
PPCs in Chandigarh
1 PPC · in use or not yet confirmed
Further reading
A well-researched list of India’s PPCs can be found on PPCs of India (opens in a new tab).
