 "<b>Dinner with BS:</b> Pramod Kapoor")
Dum Pukht’s opulent décor and menu seem all a bit too much for an unseasonably hot April evening. In retrospect, though, I am profoundly glad Pramod Kapoor chose it over a variation of Evergreen Restaurant at which I had hosted Dean Spears, the Princeton development economist. Luckily for me, he discovered that such downmarket options were available only later.
Kapoor has been a genial presence on Delhi’s publishing scene, producing a melange of mostly coffee table offerings and books on history, politics and society, part of that circle of mildly eccentric intellectual aficionados that make this notoriously philistine capital an unexpected haven for book lovers. This year has been a landmark for him. In January, he debuted as an author with Gandhi: An Illustrated Biography , a book that, surprisingly, offers new facets of this assiduously researched leader. In March, Kapoor was conferred the Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur (Knight of the Legion of Honour), the highest French civilian honour, for his contribution to promoting Indian art and culture through his 38-year-old Roli Books.
We quickly order the standard goodies on Dum Pukht’s menu: kakori kabab with naan as starter, the celebrated Dum Pukht biryani, Jhinga ki Saal (a rich prawn curry) and yellow daal. This repast, which we eventually struggle to finish, is washed down with a Sula Merlot for me and beer for him as we chat about his beginnings.
But why publishing? “There’s no one answer,” he replies. “Sure, it was partly to do with the family business of paper and my brother owned a printing press while I was in middle school. I used to love sorting out the metal type-faces with which the printing was done those days.”
Of the five brothers, he was the one interested in reading and recalls stopping by A H Wheeler shop to buy classics every time he crossed the railway station to go to school. There were antecedents too. “The fact that my Nana’s side of the family established Rupa and Co also counted. It was based in Calcutta then and when we went to visit my mother’s family in the summers we used to spend most days in the shop."
But publishing had become troubled business in the past 20 years, I say, alluding to an incident he describes in the preface to his book, where he is nearly arrested for publishing something that “may incite the public”. In fact, no such book had been published but the real story he tells me now is disturbing.
It concerned love letters to B R Ambedkar from an English lady with whom the good doctor had had an affair when he read law in London. The letters were in the possession of a professor from Maharashtra who had sourced them from Babasaheb’s first wife. A contract was duly signed to publish the letters. Two months later, the police turned up, apparently under orders from then Home Minister Shivraj Patil (“God knows how he knew”) and threatened arrest if the book was published. Then the author suddenly became incommunicado. When Kapoor checked with the contact person, it transpired that the professor had been found dead. “I don’t know if this was connected or not, but he died very suddenly.”
Nor was the Ambedkar book the only time he was threatened; an illustrated Kama Sutra , which reproduced miniatures painted centuries ago, elicited a law suit. “Someone from Mathura complained that there were suggestive pictures of Krishna in the book and a criminal case was filed. We finally won the case because we convinced the judge that there was no obscenity involved, as these were art pieces that were created hundreds of years ago. But for 10 or 11 years, I had to be at the Tis Hazari court for every hearing. It is one of the most horrid experiences of my life – and more frightening than the Ambedkar book.”
So as a publisher was he worried, I ask as the kakori kabab is served. “So long as it is not anti-national,” he replies promptly. Aha. That Key Phrase. What did that even mean? “Anything my lawyer or I would feel is not in national interest." Would he publish a book that argued, say, that Afzal Guru was innocent? “Well, it’s a very sensitive issue so I must be convinced by the documentation. After all, he was hanged after going through the entire legal process. There’s very little doubt. But if there is evidence to suggest otherwise then we’d put it in such a way that both sides are presented. I would not reject it out of hand if there is substance in it.”
Besides, he persists, it is not as though he hasn’t published controversial books. In 1984, he published a book right after the Operation Blue Star on the attack on the Golden Temple and on the massacre of the Sikhs after Indira Gandhi assassination titled The Tree That Shook Delhi by H S Phoolka and Manoj Mitta. The Polyester Prince , Hamish McDonald’s expose on the Ambani empire, which Roli Books published as Ambani & Sons , was another example.
The kakori kabab is too exquisitely mouth-melting to dwell on grim topics so I turn to the cheerful subject of the Légion d’Honneur. He explains almost apologetically how he came to collaborate with French publishers. It was about spotting a gap in the market; but where most Indian publishers tied up with the US or UK, no one went to Europe.
It was the first deal that changed the face of Roli Books. This was in 1980, when he had just bought out Roli from his partners and someone offered him a stunning book on India’s living maharajas published by a company called Flammarion. Kapoor describes the tortuous process that followed. “In those days Indians weren’t as respected in the business community as we are now. So the French publisher, just to put me off, said I would have to sell at least 3,000 copies. That was huge number -- plus the book would have cost Rs 900 in retail (about Rs 5,000 now). But the book was so good that I took the risk.
“Then he said he needed the money in advance. Now, that was a problem because the government did not allow you to remit in advance those days. I said I’d find a way. I came out fairly stressed and decided that when I get to Delhi I would send him a telex saying I couldn’t do it (imagine, there were no faxes in those days). But when I returned I mentioned it to my banker, a very nice Parsi gentleman who trusted me, a young man of 29 with so little money, and said he would open a letter of credit to guarantee the payment.
The other problem was that if he had to get the book by ship it would take three months and he would have to pay the bank before that. “So I flew in the books. It was a shipment of almost five tonnes, flown in at huge cost. But when it came, it was such a beautiful book that the distributors were competing for it. That was indeed a turning point.”
That adventure pales, though, against his media foray via Sunday Mail (1985-89), in which veteran journalists Coomi Kapoor and Sunil Sethi worked. Initially, the paper did well, with circulation touching 51,000 but it was probably doomed from the start. “If I look back I would have done many things differently. For instance, there was too much emphasis on the scams and scandals. The buzz in the office was if there is evidence against anybody, do the story. So we were perceived to be very anti-Establishment or anti-Congress as they were in power.”
No surprise, the ruling regime was responsible for closing the paper. “We were doing badly anyway and had only two weeks of newsprint. Then we started to compromise with the advertisers, issuing explanations and apologies every time something controversial appeared on them. At that point I decided that this was not why I started the paper. Then New Bank of India pulled out credit. The general manager said he got a call from the PM’s ‘very good friend’. So I sold it to the highest bidders ...[Sanjay] Dalmia.”
Not without regret. “Although I recovered all the money we had lost, it was so painful that I left Delhi and went to the mountains on a sort of ‘working sanyas’.”
Beached by the heavy repast, we’re chatting about his plans – another Gandhi book – and time at BHU (“a unique university with a huge campus and its own airfield”). Kapoor was the third batch in the business management course, which had professors from the US who, in the absence of Indian case studies, spoke of “Florida oranges and Idaho potatoes.”
And yet he took a road less travelled, so to speak, I say – a near-contemporary, for instance, was Infosys. He ruefully relates a story about meeting Jugi Tandon, founder of the iconic Tandon Corporation, at a party in the US in 1981, who advised him to jettison a career in publishing in favour of writing software. “I didn’t know what he was talking about! But now I think, maybe if I had gone into software I would have made lots more money. But after that, what?”
Kapoor has been a genial presence on Delhi’s publishing scene, producing a melange of mostly coffee table offerings and books on history, politics and society, part of that circle of mildly eccentric intellectual aficionados that make this notoriously philistine capital an unexpected haven for book lovers. This year has been a landmark for him. In January, he debuted as an author with Gandhi: An Illustrated Biography , a book that, surprisingly, offers new facets of this assiduously researched leader. In March, Kapoor was conferred the Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur (Knight of the Legion of Honour), the highest French civilian honour, for his contribution to promoting Indian art and culture through his 38-year-old Roli Books.
We quickly order the standard goodies on Dum Pukht’s menu: kakori kabab with naan as starter, the celebrated Dum Pukht biryani, Jhinga ki Saal (a rich prawn curry) and yellow daal. This repast, which we eventually struggle to finish, is washed down with a Sula Merlot for me and beer for him as we chat about his beginnings.
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His background as a Punjabi who was born in Calcutta (as it was known), grew up in Varanasi and read business management (of all things) at Benaras Hindu University (BHU) is more conducive to a Hindutva ideologue than an apolitical publisher, I say provocatively. He doesn’t take the bait, explaining that his family had shifted to Varanasi in 1942 to avoid the Japanese bombing of Calcutta, that they were “more Bengali than Bengalis – my father even spoke and wrote it” and had not spoken Punjabi at home for some generations. Much later, he tells me he’s a practising Hindu – though the daily puja is confined to his bedroom -- and doesn’t think “Hindus who talk in terms of hating Muslims are intelligent people”.
But why publishing? “There’s no one answer,” he replies. “Sure, it was partly to do with the family business of paper and my brother owned a printing press while I was in middle school. I used to love sorting out the metal type-faces with which the printing was done those days.”
Of the five brothers, he was the one interested in reading and recalls stopping by A H Wheeler shop to buy classics every time he crossed the railway station to go to school. There were antecedents too. “The fact that my Nana’s side of the family established Rupa and Co also counted. It was based in Calcutta then and when we went to visit my mother’s family in the summers we used to spend most days in the shop."
But publishing had become troubled business in the past 20 years, I say, alluding to an incident he describes in the preface to his book, where he is nearly arrested for publishing something that “may incite the public”. In fact, no such book had been published but the real story he tells me now is disturbing.
It concerned love letters to B R Ambedkar from an English lady with whom the good doctor had had an affair when he read law in London. The letters were in the possession of a professor from Maharashtra who had sourced them from Babasaheb’s first wife. A contract was duly signed to publish the letters. Two months later, the police turned up, apparently under orders from then Home Minister Shivraj Patil (“God knows how he knew”) and threatened arrest if the book was published. Then the author suddenly became incommunicado. When Kapoor checked with the contact person, it transpired that the professor had been found dead. “I don’t know if this was connected or not, but he died very suddenly.”
Nor was the Ambedkar book the only time he was threatened; an illustrated Kama Sutra , which reproduced miniatures painted centuries ago, elicited a law suit. “Someone from Mathura complained that there were suggestive pictures of Krishna in the book and a criminal case was filed. We finally won the case because we convinced the judge that there was no obscenity involved, as these were art pieces that were created hundreds of years ago. But for 10 or 11 years, I had to be at the Tis Hazari court for every hearing. It is one of the most horrid experiences of my life – and more frightening than the Ambedkar book.”
So as a publisher was he worried, I ask as the kakori kabab is served. “So long as it is not anti-national,” he replies promptly. Aha. That Key Phrase. What did that even mean? “Anything my lawyer or I would feel is not in national interest." Would he publish a book that argued, say, that Afzal Guru was innocent? “Well, it’s a very sensitive issue so I must be convinced by the documentation. After all, he was hanged after going through the entire legal process. There’s very little doubt. But if there is evidence to suggest otherwise then we’d put it in such a way that both sides are presented. I would not reject it out of hand if there is substance in it.”
Besides, he persists, it is not as though he hasn’t published controversial books. In 1984, he published a book right after the Operation Blue Star on the attack on the Golden Temple and on the massacre of the Sikhs after Indira Gandhi assassination titled The Tree That Shook Delhi by H S Phoolka and Manoj Mitta. The Polyester Prince , Hamish McDonald’s expose on the Ambani empire, which Roli Books published as Ambani & Sons , was another example.
The kakori kabab is too exquisitely mouth-melting to dwell on grim topics so I turn to the cheerful subject of the Légion d’Honneur. He explains almost apologetically how he came to collaborate with French publishers. It was about spotting a gap in the market; but where most Indian publishers tied up with the US or UK, no one went to Europe.
It was the first deal that changed the face of Roli Books. This was in 1980, when he had just bought out Roli from his partners and someone offered him a stunning book on India’s living maharajas published by a company called Flammarion. Kapoor describes the tortuous process that followed. “In those days Indians weren’t as respected in the business community as we are now. So the French publisher, just to put me off, said I would have to sell at least 3,000 copies. That was huge number -- plus the book would have cost Rs 900 in retail (about Rs 5,000 now). But the book was so good that I took the risk.
“Then he said he needed the money in advance. Now, that was a problem because the government did not allow you to remit in advance those days. I said I’d find a way. I came out fairly stressed and decided that when I get to Delhi I would send him a telex saying I couldn’t do it (imagine, there were no faxes in those days). But when I returned I mentioned it to my banker, a very nice Parsi gentleman who trusted me, a young man of 29 with so little money, and said he would open a letter of credit to guarantee the payment.
The other problem was that if he had to get the book by ship it would take three months and he would have to pay the bank before that. “So I flew in the books. It was a shipment of almost five tonnes, flown in at huge cost. But when it came, it was such a beautiful book that the distributors were competing for it. That was indeed a turning point.”
That adventure pales, though, against his media foray via Sunday Mail (1985-89), in which veteran journalists Coomi Kapoor and Sunil Sethi worked. Initially, the paper did well, with circulation touching 51,000 but it was probably doomed from the start. “If I look back I would have done many things differently. For instance, there was too much emphasis on the scams and scandals. The buzz in the office was if there is evidence against anybody, do the story. So we were perceived to be very anti-Establishment or anti-Congress as they were in power.”
No surprise, the ruling regime was responsible for closing the paper. “We were doing badly anyway and had only two weeks of newsprint. Then we started to compromise with the advertisers, issuing explanations and apologies every time something controversial appeared on them. At that point I decided that this was not why I started the paper. Then New Bank of India pulled out credit. The general manager said he got a call from the PM’s ‘very good friend’. So I sold it to the highest bidders ...[Sanjay] Dalmia.”
Not without regret. “Although I recovered all the money we had lost, it was so painful that I left Delhi and went to the mountains on a sort of ‘working sanyas’.”
Beached by the heavy repast, we’re chatting about his plans – another Gandhi book – and time at BHU (“a unique university with a huge campus and its own airfield”). Kapoor was the third batch in the business management course, which had professors from the US who, in the absence of Indian case studies, spoke of “Florida oranges and Idaho potatoes.”
And yet he took a road less travelled, so to speak, I say – a near-contemporary, for instance, was Infosys. He ruefully relates a story about meeting Jugi Tandon, founder of the iconic Tandon Corporation, at a party in the US in 1981, who advised him to jettison a career in publishing in favour of writing software. “I didn’t know what he was talking about! But now I think, maybe if I had gone into software I would have made lots more money. But after that, what?”