AP
An Indian staff member sits in his office at a central telegraph centre in Mumbai, India, Friday, June 14, 2013.
144 years after Samuel Morse sent the first telegram in Washington, the world’s final telegram will be sent in India on July 14, 2013.
Telegraph services ended in the United States seven years ago, but in India, the century-and-a-half old communication medium is still widely used to send messages. Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL), India’s state-owned telecom company, recently printed a message reads, “GRANDMOTHER SERIOUS. 15 DAYS LEAVE EXTENSION,” according to the Christian Science Monitor.
Approximately 5,000 messages are sent every day by telegram in India, a service favored for its “sense of urgency and authenticity,” a BSNL official told the Monitor.
Once the world’s fastest form of communication, telegrams can no longer compete with text messaging and smartphones, however.
"We were incurring losses of over $23 million a year because SMS and smartphones have rendered this service redundant," said Shamim Akhtar, general manager of BSNL's telegraph services. The agency did not say what the contents of the final message would be.
AP
An Indian staff of central telegraph office organizes telegrams in Mumbai, India, Friday, June 14, 2013.
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