Servo Oil

There is almost no postal administration left that does not offer the option to get stamps with your own image. Sometimes directly on the stamp, sometimes on an attached label and very occasionally both are possible. We classify these stamps as Personal Stamps, or "PS-ses" for short.
But there are also such stamps that are issued in larger numbers by the postal service itself. For the Netherlands, for example, consider the recent 75 years of Solex stamps: no stamp, but also no personal stamp. I call these stamps "semi-PS-ses".

The Indian Post offers the possibility to have these types of stamps printed in large numbers. It probably costs some money, but advertising has its price.
Such an issue is the stamp plus label of lubricating oil giant Servo. On January 28th 2023, on the occasion of Servo's 50th anniversary (in 2022!), a semi-PS was issued showing products from this oil company.

Servo was established in 1972 by Indian Oil and has grown into the largest lubricating oil company in India, with more than 1,600 types of lubricants in more than 5,300 formulations.
The special 50 years logo is depicted on the label, and normally the right part is reserved for the postage stamp. Usually an existing stamp from the regular issues. And that is where this stamp now deviates, because the 5.00 rupee (€ 0.055) stamp depicts a range of oil products from Servo, including oil in bottles for various applications.

There are even a special commemorative postmark and an FDC created for this issue. So this is really more than a normal personal stamp.

As the printing of the stamp is not very clear, here below an image of the oil cans in a larger size. Although this image from the stamp sheet margin is slightly different, the row of bottles in the foreground is the same as on the stamp.

The trained eye will find images of motorcycles on the 2 leftmost and 2 rightmost bottles, and therefore we can give this stamp (sheet) a place in our collection.

Here a larger image of the regarding bottles:

Hans de Kloet

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