Friday, April 24, 2015

‘Papri’ and ‘Barood’ - collection of Bengali short stories published from Nashik


Encouraged by the success of the first issue of Naba Nalanda and the feedback we received through the feedback forms, we took a couple of important steps to boost our presence. One of these was to identify individuals in areas like Bangalore, Bhilai, Raipur, Pune and Jabalpur and request them to be our local representatives. We were fortunate to induct such persons into our fold.
Another project we undertook was to print a collection of short stories. Since we wanted to make a start, we decided to feature our own short stories in the first volume. We named it ‘Papri’ (Petals) and the book, with five stories, ran into around 100 pages.
In the case of books, data entry was smoother as compared to the magazine. There was no question of inserting ads or images or change the layout to accommodate poems.
However, once the data entry was completed, the next problem was funds – the revenue we generated through ads and from subscription of members went towards printing of the magazine. That was a continuous and repetitive process. Therefore, in order to finance the books, we decided to contribute our own funds.
Our publisher friend agreed to get the paper through his sources, the printing of the pages would be by photo offset method and the covers would be printed by screen printing.
By the time our first book ‘Papri’ was ready, our magazine was already into its 3rd issue. It was late 1991 and, we suddenly decided to participate in the Kolkata Book Fair. So, we wrote to the Publishers and Booksellers Guild for the necessary forms.
And, took up data entry on topmost priority of our second book ‘Barood’ (Explosive) to get it published before the Book Fair to be held in January 1992. It would be a collection of crime stories.
We were confident of getting a stall allotted to us because we would be showcasing magazines and books printed outside West Bengal to the Bengalis of Kolkata who love anything out of the ordinary. (to be continued …)

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Nashik, a tourist center with links to the Mahabharata

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Another interesting blog - Citizen Journalist

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