Sri Lanka Post
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| Department overview | |
|---|---|
| Formed | 1882 |
| Jurisdiction | Government of Sri Lanka |
| Headquarters | General Post Office, Colombo, Sri Lanka |
| Department executive |
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| Parent Department | Ministry of Posts and Telecommunication |
| Website | www.slpost.gov.lk |
The Department of Posts, functioning under the brand name Sri Lanka Post, is a government operated postal system in Sri Lanka. The postal headquarters is the General Post Office which is located in Colombo. The department itself comes under the purview of the Ministry of Telecommunications and Posts. It was formally known as the Ceylon Post and Telecommunications Department and is one of the oldest Government departments in existence today.
The head of the Sri Lanka Post is the Postmaster General, currently D. L. P. Rohana Abeyrathna. Assisting in administration there is a deputy Postmaster General in every province. Sri Lanka Post employs more than 17,000 employees in various positions to staff and support the 4738 post offices across the country.
Sri Lanka Post has a long history of 209 years, dating back to 1798, when the colonial Dutch rulers started five post offices in the Maritime Districts under their control. In 1799, they published the first postal regulations and postage rates. The Dutch East India Company operated the Postal service, which was not meant for the public but for official use.
The British took control of the country in 1815. The first Postmaster General of Ceylon was A. Kennedy, an Army Officer. However, there were other Post Master Generals since 1815, when E. Bletterman was the PMG for the whole island. Mr. Lewis Sansoni succeeded Bletterman as the second Postmaster General in 1817. The third Postmaster General was Major G. Stewart, who extended the postal services to major towns in the country. They re-organised the postal service and others eventually established a permanent Post Office in Colombo in 1882.
The only evidence of a British postal service before 1815 is a "Colombo Post Free" handstamp used on a soldier's letter in 1809, when British Royal Artillery troops were engaged to subdue Sri Vikrama Rajasinha, the king of Kandy (1798–1815), whose inland territory had never been under the influence of the Dutch.
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Wikipedia