India Post releases Special Cover on Toto community's lifestyle
Aug 12, 2023
Siliguri (West Bengal) [India], August 12 : In a bid to promote the Toto community, a primitive and isolated tribal group of West Bengal's Alipurduar district, India Post has released a special cover based on the community's lifestyle.
The special cover was released at the Siliguri's head post office on Friday.
Special cover is similar to postal stamp, valued by the philatelists and stamp collectors.
Akhilesh Kumar Pandey, Post Master General (PMG), North Bengal and Sikkim, released the special cover in the presence of Dhaniram Toto, a Toto language preserver, whose name was announced as one of the recipients of Padma Shri award in the field of Literature & Education on the eve of Republic Day.
During the special cover launch ethnic music was also played by a Toto community member.
A total number of 2 thousand covers were made and will be sold among the people and philatelic deposit holders for Rs 25 each.
The cover depicts the lifestyle of the Totos.
Speaking at the event, Pandey, said, “The Toto community was on the verge of extinction so we decided to preserve and promote the community through the massive awareness programme. We tried to design the cover based on the lifestyle of the Totos. This will help them to bring back into the mainstream and also generate interest among the public to discover the area.”
While Dhaniram Toto said, “It's a great pleasure that the India Post took this initiative to promote our community. It will help us to get popularise in different parts of the country. Our community is developing and participating in the competitions as well. We appeal administration to build a museum based on Toto community at Totopara village.”
Toto’s are a very small tribal group, residing at Totopara enclave on the Western bank of Torsa river in Madarihat in Alipurduar district of West Bengal.
People of Toto community used to live in houses made of Tim and bamboo on raised platforms. Toto’s are considered to have Mongoloid features and their language beings to the Tibeto-Burman family.
A script Totobiko lawa has been developed recently for their language Totobiko Yewa by community elder Padma Shri Awardee Dhaniram Tato. The Toto’s were on the verge of becoming extinct in the 1950s, whereupon consistent efforts of the community and local administration, the population had increased to 1640 by March 2023.
