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| Best
bargains for books |
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 TV
channels may invade your drawing room, Internet may be
your favourite hobby, but books are here to stay. A famous
personality once said 'Good books are the purest essence
of the human soul and by reading them one converses with
some of the best minds that ever lived'. Books shape
up the personality, they can influence minds, send us
into an imaginative world, change views and most importantly
provide information and knowledge. Books can take us to
the unexplored, the inexperienced to a journey of fantasy
and make believe.
Books these days cost a fortune as some of the foreign
writers, which one wants desperately, are in the range
of Rs 350 - Rs 1200. The libraries are not of much help
as it takes a long time to reserve these books, by which
time the very same author is out with another book and
here starts the struggle again. But this trend has now
reversed with the coming in of second hand and pirated
books, which sell at half or less than half the original
price.
So for all you book worms and book lovers, the place to
hangout on a Sunday is the Daryaganj Book Market. As
Vikas Aggarwal a regular here puts it, "They have
a lot of variety in books. Sometimes though the books
are a bit old, but if you are not the fussy type then
I believe one can save a lot of precious dough. Very often
even original books are to be found at less then half
the prices. I am a management student and the books cost
quite a fortune, I scout here for the books and sometimes
I find what I want". Any and every kind of books,
magazines, journals, course books even old editions of
directories and dictionaries are sold.
 From
Jeffery Archer, Mills and Boon to old recipe books, encyclopedia,
and magazines are available at throwaway prices. Course
books, schoolbooks, textbooks, fiction, non-fiction, foreign
magazines and newspapers can be found at Dray Ganja book
market. According to a shopkeeper, "This market
is held here every Sunday since the last twenty years.
Many youngsters throng this place for the cheap and good
books, which we sell. Our profit margins are very low,
as most of the books, which we sell, are either second
hand, pirated or old. But when we see book lovers coming
here we don't mind haggling a bit, we don't save much.
The variety here can even put a big library to shame,
such old books and paperbacks are sold here".
It doesn't end here; there are other places in Delhi,
which sell old books at low prices. Some of the places
to visit are Shankar Market at Connaught Place,
which have a wide collection of these books as well as
original foreign editions. Some of these shops also buy
old books from their regular customers and even have a
facility of a library. A person can pay for the membership
and take old books for a certain period of time. Another
place is the Arya Samaj Road at Karol Bagh on the
footpath; some book vendors have their stalls. Mostly
pirated versions of books are found here and the lane
behind the Statesman building at CP where books can be
bought for as less as Rs 40.
The hottest hangout of Delhi i.e. the Priya Cinema complex
also has some temporary structures and vendors who sell
second hand books. The prices range anywhere from Rs 30
- 80 for a novel, depending on the condition. Books like
the Limca Book of Records of the year 2000 is available
at Rs 65 and course books can be bought in the range of
Rs 75 - Rs 700. Old issues of Vogue, Cosmopolitan, Gem
and Jewels, Libas, are priced between Rs 75 - 150. The
books are in a readable condition and sometimes books,
which are not available at leading shops, can be procured
from such places. According to Monica, a production assistant
with a TV Channel, "I would just like to give a tip
to everyone that all you book lovers don't waste your
precious money on new hardcover and paperbacks. It's time
to save on books, so go and splurge on old and second
hand books, be sensible. Even though they maybe old and
tattered, but just remember 'old is gold' and not to forget
another one, 'A penny saved is a penny earned'."
Text and Pics by Jyoti Narang |
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4:53:02 AM 
