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I wish to buy FDCs of Indian commerative stamps issued between 1980-2000 at 10 times of face value of the stamps .Payment will be made by paypal in US $.
I donot want needless comment on this offer.Please post here only if you to offer anything .
Thanks for looking at my want.
opkedia

I can offer FDC from the given period at 100 times the face value. Paypal accepted (+ 4% charges)

cheers, abhay

Abhay, I think the figure was 10 times face not 100 times

Apologies for this "needless comment" okpedia52, but you're going to get it anyway:

Are these that rare as most other countries FDC's of that era are worth less than face

Exactly my point

1980s - Average FV would have been INR 1.2 (Which would have been around USD 10c those days).
1990s - Average FV would be around INR 3.5 (around US 10c as INR was devalued in 1990's)

Surprisingly even today Indian FDC's - FV would be around US 15c in most instances.

That probably explains why it they are not below face. Just my thoughts. Too low a value to be sold at below FV

Good point there from a pure currency perspective.

In my opinion the period from 1983-2003 has become somewhat sought after in Indian Philately after the surge in prices in the Phila India catalog which dominates the burgeoning collectors market in India (blame relatively higher prices of SG/Scott catalogs and lack of their availability). This price surge is a deliberately inflated one as there is no logical methodology that has been followed for this random assigning of indicative prices.

This Indian counterpart of the catalog prices some stamps at ridiculously high prices (vis a vis SG/Scott) which has made even the FDCs sought after.

As an example, the SG #1516a, Horizontal se-tenent pair commemorating 60th anniv of Indian Air Force is priced at GBP 4 in the latest Stanley Gibbons catalog. This is priced at GBP 25 in Phila India and the FDC for this goes at a minimum of GBP 17 (this is crazy, but then the vagaries of prices take their weirdest effect in Philately for one). The recovery in prices for a bigger FDC lot would come from very few stamps by this logic and hence the readiness of people to buy FDCs at ten times the face value in INR (and therefore my insistence to sell them at 100 times the face value).

Abhaytiku,

We cannot do much about the price surge can we? The GPO corridor crooks (read collectors turned dealers) are suddenly on the rise and are buying everything off from the GPO. They are fooling people and I have seen people buying stamps and then storing them in their wallets.

At the backend, the Phila India man Mr. Manik Jain is putting his own sweet prices for the stamps. On top of that some of the dealers or stamp sellers are even reluctant to accept that catalog price and selling for more

But they do have buyers!

I think we should simply move on accepting the fact that we collectors are their dancing monkeys.

_________________
Always looking for Mint Definitive Sets, UPU 1949 stuffs and Socked on Nose cancellations

So, 10 x face would be $1.00 to $1.50...

There are a number of covers on this site in EXACTLY that price range:

http://www.buckacover.com/covers/search.php?code=indfdc

Hopefully something of use to opkedia

Precisely right in USD

But if he is looking at INR (Indian Rupee) FV multiple, he might be off quite a bit.

Most of them would be 30-40x!!

BTW, thanks for the website. Helps me!!

@gavin-h: Many thanks Gavin !! Don't know about okpedia but I did pick more than 10 great FDCs including the elusive Africa Fund and Madras GPO FDC for a dollar a piece !!

@indieguy: I think we can't just submit to this dealer led circus and the collector's have to come together in a forum where they can exchange or buy at mutually agreeable and fair prices from each other. Maybe a wiki/thread should be started here at Stampboards for the same purpose.

The Phila India catalogue has done the biggest dis-service to the philatelic community in India then anything else. Second in line are majority of dealers who are traveling salesmen rather than dealers with even a grain of philatelic expertise (I am yet to see a dealer at exhibitions here who uses a tweezer to handle his stamps!). Finally, the smart alec collectors, some of whom think that stamps can fetch them an astronomical return on investment.

We sure are wading through troubled waters, but I would only (time and again) implore the collectors to come together

Oh no!!!... I hope they list more soon...

Could not have put it any better. Sent you a message with regards to this.

And leave alone tweezers, I have seen these salesmen handling stamps while munching on Lay's Potato Chips.

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Always looking for Mint Definitive Sets, UPU 1949 stuffs and Socked on Nose cancellations

Can you add me to that group as well.

I live outside India though.

Just as a rough guide to me, what do the single stamp common 1980s type Indian covers get fair retail - in USD?

I have always assumed they are 20c type items - is that still the case?

The common FDCs of 1960s-1970s-1980s can still be purchased at 10c a piece or even less if you are lucky.

The stamps in sets may be bit costly but mostly in the range of 1-4$.

It is only in 1990s when interest in Indian philately was at the lowest,dealers and collectors didn't kept high inventory of FDCs or mint stamps.

Coincidentally it was also the time when Indian economy was in bad shape and at one time India had to mortgage its gold reserve for foreign currency.

Now people are investing money in stamps and I came to know from local philatelic bureau that new accounts are being opened for supply of full sheets of new issues.

This may be due to abnormal hike in prices of Indian philatelic material as well as Indian economy doing quite well.

The aforesaid points to two conclusions:

Interest in Philately is directly related to economy.

The exorbitent prices of Indian stamps in 1990s are due to low inventory .

Thanks.
opkedia

The prices of stamps are not just subject to economic conditions. A whole lot of other factors influence it. Thematic content, printed quantity etc being other parameters (and their are many many more).

Talking about a surge in philatelic activity in India currently, it is not the collectors who are buying stamp sheets in droves, rather it is just a handful of dealers who are doing so. I contacted the Hyderabad Philatelic Bureau and the estimated number of collectors with standing order account for this city of 6.8M people is around 1200. So much for your upscale, urbane sheet buying collectors !!

Philately in its true form is not just being discouraged, it is dying a slow death in India. No single person or clique in my opinion can be blamed for this turn of events. The blame falls squarely on an incompetent, ill-equipped and ill-mannered department with no philatelic training what-so-ever, and the profiteers in garb of collectors/dealers.

Stamps from 1990s are highly priced in India only. Yes, only in India. Their catalogue values are as high or as low as any stamp with a specific combination of printed quantity, thematic content and type should have. The same applies to the FDCs from the same period.

Plus distribution mode. Currently commemoratives are unevenly distributed across the GPOs.


These dealers have backdoor relations with the GPO staffs. I wrote once to the Director, GPO, Kolkata to make a separate counter for volume sales. Most of the times, the counters are blocked by these selfish, crooked so called dealers who just exhaust rims of sheets and M/S leaving behind nothing for us. And we wait for hours to buy a handful of the new issues or that traffic signal corner copy!



viewtopic.php?f=13&t=317&p=2563937
Pointed out the same in 2010 on this board.




The thing that amazes me is, people who sell stamps for CV fail to understand that they freaking need to handle mint stamps with a pair of freaking solingen tweezers! They can't afford to buy one of these but ask them the price of a stamp they will tell you a bible of why it is priced so high.

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Always looking for Mint Definitive Sets, UPU 1949 stuffs and Socked on Nose cancellations

Folks on the subject on Indian FDC, can you guys please advise me a fair ball park figure to offer these at here?

All are Gandhi.

I saw a 1948 Gandhi FDC last week that had been in a FIRE, and half of it was burnt away totally (I kid you not!) and it still sold for $1000 or something crazy on ebay!

I know these are sadly not 1948 issues but am guessing they have some decent value?

Never saw that Gandhipex Special cover. Should be a well sought after item by Gandhi thematic collectors.

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Always looking for Mint Definitive Sets, UPU 1949 stuffs and Socked on Nose cancellations

1. Top left : Gandhi Centenary issue of 4 stamps (1969) - around USD 4-5 with all stamps (may be USD 2-3 more if i'm desperate)
This particular cover (would not call this a pure FDC) has the other Gandhi + Nehru stamp with a special cancellation from 1977. How do you value such random covers.

2. Top right : Might not have a great value either, but might be surprised on the +ve side.

3. Bottom left : Has no real connection with the stamp issued except both were statesmen and were part of the independence movement. Would think someone had the foresight of Gandhi philately and hence got the cover done. Its not the official FDC either.

4. Bottom right : No view on this one. Again the same comment to 3 applies. Unconnected catchet.

Net net think the entire lot would leave you surprised on the lower side, unless you can sell it on ebay!!

Well ALL are new to me.

A few more pix of that one below.

This one is available now on ebay.in for around USD 5 with a 1969 commemorative stamp on it.

http://www.ebay.in/itm/India-1977-Gandh ... 20b98d6994

So if I price these covers for stock at about $A20 the lot that seems about right?

Glen

Hi Glen,

I think two covers are about average but the first two covers are very interesting.

The first cover is most interesting as it has an amazing two instances of triple concordance in form of the "charkha" (loom) being in both the cachets and the illustration on FDC (one of the cachet is designed as a charkha) and Mahatma Gandhi's image being on both stamps and the cover illustration.

The second cover has a Mahatma Gandhi definitive which seems to be very interesting in the sense that it has triple concordance in form of image on the stamp, image in the cachet and the illustration on the FDC.

I my opinion the first two covers would make the lot a good buy at AUD 20

cheers