Times may change. But this bookstore will not

Faqir Chand is one of the oldest bookstores the country has. And also perhaps the tiniest. With books unevenly arranged, the bookstore is a historical landmark. Here’s a quick personal account of my visit here

What does it feel like visiting probably the oldest book store alive in India? That tiny bookstores are still a welcome sight. Faqir Chand bookstore stands as a testament to people’s love for buying books from a physical bookstore and stubbornness of the owners, who have kept the store kicking in all times.

As I walked into this really miniature store with barely any seating arrangement for anybody else but the store manager and company, I met three young girls, probably school girls. I asked them why people flocked to Faqir Chand. One of them in her soft tone said, it was because the legend has it that when you come to this place and pick up a book, the book you pick up is what life wants to convey to you. That sounded like having landed the magic land. To hear life talk to me in cryptic words through books sure makes Faqir Chand one of the most important landmarks of the Capital. But after a few minutes passed by and a local from Delhi laughed at me when I shared the secret the young girl had shared with me. In general life takes us to places and things that the innermost of us is reaching out to, said my company. Only Faqir Chand is blessed with magical power was the young girl’s talent to weave an interesting story.

Moving on to some serious notes, the bookstore Faqir Chand was established in 1957 by a man named Faqir Chand. Since then the store has been at the same spot, in the same appearance with books unevenly arranged. Yes, one doesn’t know where to look for the book one wants to buy. It requires a task of rummaging through many books to reach the desired one. It is said that nothing about the store has changed since its inception. Only those who walk into it change. Unsure which popular figures visited the bookstore in the yore, in the recent times it was journalist Ravish Kumar and author Arundhati Roy who were found in there for book signing sessions. Now you know how important the store is!

The store may be old-fashioned but it is located in the plush Khan market. There is a history to this store. The founder Faqir Chand actually lived in what is now Pakistan. While he was in Peshawar, his love for books prompted him to start the bookstore business sometime in 1931. As the partition had its way with everybody on both the sides of the border, Faqir Chand had to flee Peshawar with his family. In those days, all the refugees were stationed at Khan market and were allotted a flat and a store. Some years later, it was again time for Faqir Chand to re-start his business, which is now being run by the fourth generation of the family.

I picked up a Sartre. Nausea to be precise. As I walked up to the billing counter, the lady companion of the store manager, Abhinav Bahmi, said she was reading the same book. Whether the store speaks to its customers or not is uncertain, but synchronicity sure exists in there.