Shhhh, we're reading

Unlikely words in Chandigarh? Don't bet on it, the city is turning to books in a big way.

Chandigarh has pinned itself on the Indian marketing map with the help of two counts of leadership: mobile phone penetration and Mercedes S class sales upon launch. So, the city is well off. Is it also well read?

It has 85 libraries and 61 bookstores for a population of just about one million (literacy rate: 82 per cent). But book reading, according to observers, has only just got past the curve of the hockey stick.

The city's libraries are no longer the sleepy places they used to be. According to the Chandigarh Library Association, the British Council library, which caters to the entire region including Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Jammu & Kashmir, has been busy changing things.

It now has 10,000 individual members, apart from 300 institutional members, and is beginning to induce a sense of competition in other libraries.

Marketers are keeping watch. In early March, the Delhi-based retail chain Ebony Retail Holdings plans to launch a new chain of bookstores in association with Corner Bookstore, starting from Chandigarh and Noida.

According to Lalit Kumar, CEO and director, Ebony, book retailing is now in the top five categories of retail opportunity, along with food, electronics, apparel and accessories.

"We see a 20-25 per cent annual growth, which is a good indicator," he says, attracted by the city's twin highs of spending power and literacy.

Not to be left behind, local player The Browser is also looking at expanding its 7,500 sq ft outlet in Chandigarh "" a library-cum-store format that it has pioneered in the region (with other outlets in Jalandhar and Mohali). An in-house coffee shop is on its way, and other value-added services too.

For The Browser's chief, Pankaj P Singh, the priorities are stock expansion and ambience upgradation. "I want a section to be alive, with a lot of participation and interaction from members," says Singh, hinting at author sessions and reading groups.

Currently, The Browser has 4,500 members, and Singh expects to touch 10,000 soon. "If this model sells and achieves its goal," says Singh, "then we'll replicate the model in metros across India."

These large format bookstores are far more flamboyant than the modestly focused stores of earlier decades, such as Nomad Bakka's sophisticated little shop in Sector 17.

But then, student culture nowadays thrives on multimedia stimulants. The point is to rejuvenate the city's once-vibrant reading culture, no matter exactly how.