44-year-old Marathi publishing house is ready to get bigger than ever

The Granthali Vishwastha Sanstha has been operating out of a Marathi municipal school in Matunga West for the last six years It has moved six offices since it was launched in 1974 PicsPradeep DhivarIts a busy morning when we visit Granthali Vishwastha Sanstha a Marathi publishing house located on the ground floor of Woolen Mill Municipal School Matunga West A volunteer is busy labelling books in the corridor Inside the 350 sqft space theres a smell of freshly printed books Stacked with tomes some almost reaching the ceiling theres little room to navigate But thats how Granthali has operated over the decades with offices being moved over six timesPlaywright Vijay Tendulkar fourth from right was an ardent supporter of the movement This picture was taken in Aurangabad at a Granthali event in 1988The publishing house was launched in 1974 by journalists Ashok Jain Dinkar Gangal Arun Sadhu and Kumar Ketkar who initially intended to create an informal organisation to spread the culture of reading among Marathi speakersOver the years it has seen several members come and go and even survived a slump But now the publishing house is ready for its next big inningsGranthali has published several iconic books including Dalit memoir BalutaMore than a universityLast week Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis provided a land grant to Granthali to set up a Marathi University in Bandras Bandstand area They have also been offered a sprawling 2000 sqft office a few metres from the current location The idea is to enable native Marathi speakers forge a new connection with their literature But whether the initiative will help bring about change still remains to be seenIronically the Granthali office is located inside a Marathi medium municipal school that has been struggling with new enrolments due to lack of students On the day of our visit we see only a handful playing in the quadrangle Given the situation trustee and treasurer Dhananjay Gangal feels the move couldnt have come at a better time I wouldnt however call it a university as we wont have courses professors or a vicechancellor What we have in mind is a space where we will hold workshops and festivals on the Marathi language We also have plans to set up a digital library he saysLanguage of the massesUntil now as many as 130 publications have been produced by them with many new authors hailing from smaller towns The emerging breed of writers are mostly from II and IIItier towns he saysThis is in stark contrast to the situation that the founders confronted back in the 1970s where most literature was being produced by people in the urban areas At the time literature was elitist So the founders initiated steps to ensure that the reading habit went beyond the privileged urban middle class he saysIt was also a period of great turbulence the IndoPakistani War of 1971 inflation Dalit Panther and womens liberation movement The literature of the period reflected the mood of the people and yet it did not reach vast sections of the readers he addsThe reason behind this was lack of accessibility and availability of books rather than interest feels Sudesh Hinglaspurkar executive trustee At the Marathi Sahitya Sammelan at Ichalkaranji in 1973 the foundermembers met at a Mumbai restaurant and decided to form an ad hoc organisation called GranthaliEach one wrote postcards introducing Granthali and requesting the addressees to spread the message Playwright Vijay Tendulkar was one of its core members Each one decided to contribute by shelling out R25 from their pockets With this we decided to become publishers recalls Gangal The idea was to offer readers four books for Rs 25 This received a thunderous response recalls HinglaspurkarMaking it accessibleThe reading public that would normally have had to pay at least Rs 60 or more for four books was buoyed by the sheer volume they could access with the sum Hinglaspurkar recalls how buses were arranged filled with books that could be distributed among masses in the hinterland With this new authors were discovered and new subjects were written about The literature of each period reflected the mood of the time While the 70s saw writings that were more politicallydriven it mellowed later says GangalDaya Pawar a little known Dalit writer was one such gem His book Baluta one of the first Dalit autobiographies that Granthali published shook Marathi readers out of their reverie It captured the life of deprivation that the caste system forced on members of the community It was considered a benchmark for Dalit memoirs He used language not only to revolt but for deep introspectionOne book that continues to fascinate Gangal is Arun Sadhus Sinhasan Throne which captured the imagination of his readers for its outstanding plot The novel was based on politics and corruption It highlighted the deep nexus between politicians and trade union leaders and industries The movie was made into a film by Jabar PatelOver the years the group has received its share of brickbats with some claiming said that Granthali had drifted from the objective of providing books at affordable prices and others pointing to the drop in editorial quality Yes there was criticism But thats what it means to be in a democracy You agree to disagree says GangalFor him one of the biggest achievements of the organisation was giving a voice to people who would have otherwise not written For instance Sudhir and Nandini Thatte two BARC employees have been writing a childrens book titled Nobel Nagaratil Naval Sapne where they explain the life and achievements of Nobel prize winnersLast month they also published a thriller Lochgriffin on the lines of Jeffrey Archer by Vasant Vasant Limaye a CEO of High Places Private Limited an outbound management training in India The task cut out for them now is to attract the younger audience Its a challenge I admit But its not impossible to achieve he addsCatch up on all the latest Mumbai news crime news current affairs and also a 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