Still On The 'Same' Page

Till a year ago, before the pandemic struck the country, every Sunday is a sort of festive day for bibliophiles of all types in the city – academic, fiction or non-fiction – would rush to Abids where it is sort of a retail therapy for book lovers to leave through or poring over pages of books that meet their needs or rake up their interest. For serious readers, for academic or competitive examinations, keen on sourcing either second-hand or first-hand books, there is another market that runs on all week days, a hardly 2km away.

The Koti book wholesale market was among the worst-hit by the pandemic and though things are slowly returning back to normal, the business remains grim for book sellers. There are over 250 book traders and distributors in the Koti market. Until March 2020 this used to a source of employment for about 2000 to 3000 people. However, the changed market situation has resulted in at least 40 per cent of them losing their jobs, as book shop owners were unable to pay their salaries.

According to Suresh Sharma, owner of one of the oldest and popular books selling store, Neelkamal in Koti, the situation for the books market completely changed during COVID-19, as every school, college, and all other educational institutions have chosen to teach and study 'online' thus they don't need any books for it as they prepare power point presentations and giving lectures over virtual calling."

Many book sellers say that their shops have turned into godowns with books, as there is no sale even after the reopening of educational institutions. Some small book traders were forced to sell out their entire lot. Earlier, they used to purchase old books from people but now such sales happen now.

Until March 2020, these book stores used to have a staff of at least 10 people working in each book shop, but now these shops have only 5 people working in each shop. Three are asked to work for 15 to 20 days as their owners can only pay half of the salary.

JB Books sellers and distributors owner Mohammed Hameeduddin Adnan says, "We were forced to reduce the number of our staff from 25 to 10 as there were no sales for almost a year. Even after schools and college are reopened, we have not had any sales for books, even as exams are being conducted by the government."

Though some publishers were able to print the 2021 editions of some important books dedicated to exams, most of the publishers from Delhi, Bombay, and other states were unable to print the new-year's edition books due to pandemic. This has led to increase the prices of books at the Koti book market, which is known only for wholesale and 50 per cent discount on all the books.

"Due to COVID-19 guidelines most of the major publishers, who every year print a new edition for the CBSE syllabus, engineering and other courses didn't print the new edition of 2021 as they left with no staff and unable to transport the material to Hyderabad, due to which we had removed the discount from books, which had been there since Koti book market was formed," said Adnan.