Earlier this month, I decided to head
out to one of the oldest book markets of Delhi – the Daryaganj Sunday book
market. After having read some rave reviews about the place and of the insane
discounts, I knew that I had to visit it, being the bookworm that I am.
So earlier that morning, I
grabbed a large oversized bag with me, so as to accommodate all the novels that
I had planned on buying. I had spent the entire previous day making an elaborate,
well thought-out, meticulous list, that I had pondered over for hours on end.
There were around 25 books that I had finalized on. A friend of mine even told
me that the “banned” books often find a way in this Sunday market. So, I was
all excited, happy and good to go.
And the place was honestly a bummer.
It turned out that battling Delhi’s sweltering
heat was the easiest task amongst everything else that ensued.
The dingy lanes, the whole
pushing-and-shoveling-rumpus, vagabond-ish men whistling and singing Honey
Singh’s rap while leering at you. (FYI, I was in my T-shirt and palazzo pants –
for those of you who don’t stay updated on fashion trends, palazzos basically
look like loose pajamas. The point
being, none of it warranted any cheap ogling. So MCPs should find another
excuse to blame women, because the fault definitely does not lie with their
attire!)
As for the books which I so
dearly love, it was heart breaking to see novels splattered all over the road. (Because,
for me, novels are not just printed pages bundled together. When I buy a novel,
it becomes almost a part of me. I read it in the metro, in the college
corridors, in between lectures, and I even read myself to sleep, on many days. Moreover,
I have skipped meals to complete a really interesting book! And the smell of a
new book instantly brightens up my day.)
So, to see novels splashed across the
pavement, with sellers actually standing on them with their dirty feet was
honestly appalling.
The entire road was flooded with vendors selling books, some of them on per-kilo basis. Yes, you read it correctly. Per-kilo. Like vegetables being sold. For me, it was almost blasphemous!
Yes, the discounts were pretty
crazy. But, most of the books were second-hand. And novels accounted for a small
fraction of the whole market. Mainly, there were academic books and the sort.
The sellers had no idea who Jeffrey Archer or Dan Brown were. Or for that
matter, even Salman Rushdie, Vikram Seth, Anita Desai or Leo Tolstoy. 90% of
them were clueless about the name of the authors or the books they were themselves
selling. Well, I kind of expected that part.
The only novel which I spotted with almost each and every seller was ‘The fault
in our stars’. When I asked them why it was so, they said that this book is the
latest fad among people and it sells like hot cakes. Thus justifying their
stock of a dozen copies of it. So much for literature. And there I was, hoping
I might be able to lay my hands on Salman Rushdie’s ‘Satanic Verses.’(It’s a
banned book in India.)
But one thing for which I’m content is that I actually went and saw the place for
myself. For if I hadn’t done so, I’d have never known that it definitely does
not live up to the hype. That, and the 4 novels I bought from there :)
