Books fly off shelves after Jaswant's expulsion

Booksellers, however, say that the sales of ‘Jinnah: India-Partition-Independence’ have boomed due to the present political salvo and will taper down once the controversies subside.

The marketing branch of Rupa’s Bangalore office has exhausted the stocks in its possession and has placed orders for 1,000 copies with its head office at New Delhi. “All the 800 books with us were sold to booksellers due to large orders from them. We continue to get more orders and are replenishing our stocks. However, we will receive them only by Monday or Tuesday and cannot cater to the demands until than,” said a representative.

The previous book by Singh, ‘A Call to Honour’ too created quite a rage as it spoke of a mole in former Prime Minister P V Narasimha Rao’s office leaking information to American sources. “Since that book did well, we expected the remarks on Jinnah to create controversy and were prepared to some extent.” Any book that sells even 500 copies in the City is considered a great book, saleswise, and Jaswant’s book has already done that, he added.

Not many takers
There were not many takers for the book at ‘Crossword’ book store on Residency Road since it arrived a week ago. “But just on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, we sold 35 books. We have more at hand, ” said Floor-in-charge of its Books section, Manjunath. “I cannot say it is a bestseller. It is doing good now but this kind of buying fever will not last long,” he says.

 Bookworm in Shrungar Complex (off M G Road) is offering a 20 per cent discount on the book, a regular feature with all books sold here. “We have sold 30 copies till now, there was a rush on Wednesday evening after news of the BJP leader’s expulsion and we sold seven copies in two hours,” says  Krishna, the proprietor. He has placed orders for 25 more copies. It will never be a bestseller, he adds. “It is not a book for the masses and the present controversy around it is fuelling sales.”

Kumar, cashier at Higginbothams said that the first batch of five books ordered had sold out, “We have placed orders for another batch a couple of days ago but they have not come.”

Prakash Gangaram, Proprietor, Gangaram Book House said that ten books which arrived first had been sold, and orders were placed for another ten. “We will not rush through things but place orders for ten more.”