Recently Ramprasad Mahurkar, a fifteen year old boy got the coveted Vermeil Special Prize for his exhibit in PCI National Stamp Show held in Mumbai recently. Ramprasad Mahurkar is grandson of LtCol (retd) Rajesh Gupta, who lives in Indraprastha Layout in Nagpur.
Ramprasad lives in Mumbai. He participated in the youth category in national-level Philatelic exhibition ‘Inpex-2019’organised by Philatelic Congress of India (PCI), which is the apex Philatelic body in India. The title of Ramprasad’s exhibit was ‘A dialogue with the flying Jewels (Butterflies and Moths)’. He got 83 out of 100 marks. It was the highest in the youth category. However, he has to his credit several honours.In‘Balpex-2018’ he won a Gold medal. In the event, he won Youth Grand Award, scoring 88 out of 100 points. Previously, he got Fran Jennings Memorial Award (Creativity Award), and ATA Youth Award.
Ramprasad started taking interest in butterflies since his visit to an open air butterfly garden close to his home. The garden is atop a dumping ground. Through conversation with a botanist, he came to know more about the importance of butterflies in human life and need for their conservation. Soon after, he took up research on butterflies of different types. Gradually, he started collecting stamps of butterflies and moths.