“The motto is not to sell books but to raise generations that are in love with literature,” says Sunil Nevatia, owner of Pages Bookstore. From a stationery shop in Daba Gardens to city’s most loved bookstore, Sunil’s journey is fuelled by his love for books and his passion to serve the book lovers.
The journey of his book business began from a small stationery shop, Andhra Stationery Syndicate, which was started by his elder brother in Daba Gardens in 1970. “In the initial days, it catered to just stationery and few academic books. Five years down the line, Amar Chitra Katha was the first book that we started selling apart from the school textbooks,” he says. He shares that Amar Chitra Katha was one of the most popular comic series read in the 1970s.
The growing demand for academic books seeded the idea of opening a new store and that was the beginning of Jyoti Book Depot which was established in 1986. Over the years, the store also made space for novels and children’s story books along with academic ones. To satisfy the growing demand for the books, the store was moved to a much bigger space in 1992.
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Changing with the times
“In those days, the city had a culture of selling books over the counter like medicines sold in pharmacies. Our new store was one-of-its-kind, which kept books on display facilitating the reader to go around the store and choose for themselves,” he says. He adds that the store received an overwhelming response from the city and had regular customers from various districts of Andhra Pradesh and Odisha. “ In those days, making a phone call was very expensive. That is why we would note down the address of the readers and send them postcards informing them about the arrival of their books,” he says.
By this time he was entrenched in the book business and Jyoti Book Depot was the go-to place for books. Sharing an anecdote that speaks volumes about the store’s popularity, Sunil says, “When we shifted the shop in Daba Gardens, our visiting cards had the address ‘opposite BSNL office’; after two years, BSNL bills started having the address ‘opposite Jyoti Book Depot’. It had become a landmark for the residents.”
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As their customer base increased, Sunil realised that there was a high demand for books in regional language and this prompted him to enter the world of publication. The bookstore sells Telugu translations of famous books. “We reached out to retired Telugu language professors and also the professors of Telugu Department at the Andhra University for translations,” he adds.
In the year 2006, Sunil along with his younger brother Anil started another book store called Pages at Ramnagar, which catered to general books from all categories. From the adventures of Tintin and Diary of a Wimpy Kid to the book series of Game of Thrones, the store has everything. Speaking about the book preferences of the city, Sunil says, “Romantic novels were in demand seven to eight years ago, but now it is mostly autobiographies, books on self-help, leadership and soft skills that sell the most.”
Blurring boundaries
The bookstore has also been a pioneer in bringing famous authors to the city for book reading sessions. In the past, authors like Ravindar Singh, Sudhir Nagarkar, Shiv Khera and Pramod Batra have visited the store and hosted sessions for the book lovers of the city. Going beyond the conventional definition of a bookstore, Pages periodically hosts art workshops and storytelling sessions for children.