Hi ! After Vadodara, I am in Silvassa now. It's small beautiful capital city of Dadra Nagar Havelli. Yesterday I had seen its marvellous Portuuguese Church and was thrilled to see its wonderful decoration for Christmas...But memories of Vadodara are always around me...What a great time I had there...Besides the great show I met a large number of philatelists from different parts of the country..I knew most of them by name and many of them are subscribers of my newsletter but it was a great moment to meet them all in person...I especially remember my all friends & great philatelists of Ahmedabad......Mr Shrikant Parikh, Mr Dhanjay Desai, Mr Praful Thakkar,Mr Ilias Patel,Mayank Kathiara,Mr Prakash Jambudi....How nice to meet them all in person with whom I communicate through email every day...But I missed one person to meet Mr Varad Dhaky ! .......Well some new person I met Ms Mayuri a very enthusiast philatelist of Ahmedabad....There was the biggest group from Orissa which also got the maximum highest awards at the exhibition...I was thrilled to meet them all as I had spent a long time in Bhubaneshwar..It was great to Mr Mr Anil Dhir and got a chance to see his wonderful collection of Mourning Covers " Edged in Black".....It was nice to meet Mr Venkat Rao,Mr Pradip Mohanty (Cuttack) ,Mr Anup Rout, Mr SS Rath ( Bhubaneshwar),Mr Shakil Ahmed (cuttack),Bibhudatta Mishra and many more .....Well some great philatelists from West Bengal..Shri Dipok Dey,Sekhar Chakraborty, Souvik Roy & Mr Moloy Sarkar, Mr Madhukar Deogaonkar...I have a great association with philatelists of West Bengal. So it was great to meet them in person..I was so happy to meet Mr Dipok Dey......the only person I know since my school days....After West Bengal It was a great pleasure to meet philatelists from Chennai of South India Philatelists Association of which I am a life member....It was really nice to meet Mr C G Bhaskar, Mr Bal Krishna Das, Mr Nelson and some more.... A young philatelist Mr Roshan Prasad from Sikkim...I remember him very well.....From Rajasthan..It was nice meeting with Mr Rajesh Paharia...From Bihar...Mr Pradip Jain, Mr Pradeep Kumar Mullick & Mr Pradeep Kumar Agarwal...From MP I met Mr Hemant Kumar Jain....Well from Chattisharh...Mr Naresh Agarwal, Mr Atul Jain and Mr CR Andhare.... From Chhattisigarh, Col Suresh Bagga & Mr Rakesh Walia...Many more names are to be mentioned whom I remember Mr Arvind Mullick from Jabalpur (MP), Mrs Damyanti Pittie, Mr Ajay Kumar Mittal.....Well last but not the least philatelists from my hometown, Kanpur, Mr Arun Agarwal & Mr Shafiq Khan....It was like meeting family members as I know both of these persons since the time I was in school in 80's....Last but not the least I must mention the name of Mr Deepak Modi, the creator of Mobile Philately in India...whom I met when I was leaving the venue...so nice to meet him...Now some more names coming to my mind Mr Umesh Kekkadi, Mr Satish Mishra,Mr & Mrs Madhukar Jhingan, Rajesh Verma, Mr Abhai Mishra, Mr Vinod Sabhawal, Mr Dinesh Chandra Sharma, Saumitra from Dehradun and many more .....these are unforgettable memories for me....Well at last....how can I forget Mr Prashant Pandya & Mr Timir Shah and all their family members.....It was a short meeting with them as these persons were most busy, being organizers.....but I know Mr Pandya & Mr Timir Shah who put their more thant 100% to make this show successful....It is a great achievement of Baroda Philatelic Society....Above all Stampmania was a great platform for all philatelists to meet and exchange their views....It was a memorable event for me which I would never forget....This is all from this beautiful city Silvassa...I shall be leaving today for Kanpur & Lucknow ......I will write more from there...Till then Have a Nice Time !!
