Illustration by Suman Choudhury

It takes some furious digging to get to the black leatherbound book, buried under a heap of second-hand Mills & Boon romances. The Other Side of Paradise, says the golden lettering on the cover. A note ? “from Mom and Dad to Sam, Christmas 1994” ? neatly written in longhand on the flyleaf of the F. Scott Fitzgerald classic is the only evidence of its previous ownership. “Twenty rupees,” says the vendor, without much ado.

It’s a deal that amply justifies sacrificing those 40 Sunday-morning winks. Which is why the second-hand book market that mushrooms every Sunday along a line of downed shutters in Delhi’s Daryaganj district finds more than its share of takers.

Comprising some 160 roadside stalls, the market seems to have something for everyone ? Samir Goyel just bought himself a silverfish-riddled War and Peace and his son a hardbound copy of one of the Mallory Towers series. Elsewhere, undergraduates dig into the heaps to fish for texts that form part of their academic curriculum. Knowledge comes cheap in these quarters, and few are willing to give it a miss.

It’s been 40 years since the market came into being, says Devinder, a stall-owner. Now in his 50s, Devinder claims he was among the first vendors to set up shop here. “I have grown up selling books on this street,” he says. “Where else can I go now?”

Insecurity has crept up Devinder’s spine of late. Last month, as part of its drive to clean up the congested pavements of Daryaganj, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) asked the second-hand booksellers in the area to shift base to less-congested areas. And the fact that the stalls had no registration to fall back upon only tilted the scales in favour of the MCD.

Compromises have been made since then and an understanding reached. The vendors claim they do not have an impending crisis staring them in the eye, at least not for the time being. But deep down, they know that the future is uncertain. The MCD recently succeeded in relocating the junk vendors of Chor Bazaar from the lawns of Red Fort to a desolate patch of land near the Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium. If that incident has any bearing, it may not be long before the booksellers are asked to follow suit.

“The officials have earmarked an area near Rajghat to relocate us to,” says Subhash Chandra Agarwal, president of the Sunday Book Bazaar Patri Welfare Association. “But tell me, why would anyone want to go all the way to Rajghat to buy second-hand books?”

Arguments apart, if the MCD finally has its way, the Daryaganj book market could become the second book market in India to be relocated in recent times. Earlier this year, the book market near the Flora Fountain area in Mumbai was dealt a similar blow.

Amid the tension, however, it’s business as usual for the Daryaganj vendors. For many of them, it’s their only means of livelihood. Pankaj, who plies his trade from a spot in front of an ATM counter, says he spends the week picking up discarded books. “Wholesalers, distributors, retail shops, residences of book collectors ? I go to all possible places where there may be books for the taking,” he says. “Sometimes, people even sell rare collections which have been handed down to them, since they don’t know the true value of the books.”

Even as he speaks, he pulls out a tattered copy of Tintin in the Land of Soviets from underneath a pile of books. The book is damaged beyond recognition ? a few pages are missing. But it’s still a prize catch. A regular buyer has reserved it over the phone, announces Pankaj, much to the disappointment of those around.

Every six days of scouring the city for books are followed by the Sunday sale, where booksellers hope to find a price for their stocks. Going by the prices they are offered at ? a meagre Rs 10 to a not-so-unaffordable Rs 500 ? few copies remain to be taken stock of at the end of the day.

The collections in most of the shops are eclectic, to say the least. There is no discrimination between pulp and classic, or theology and do-it-yourselves. Interior design manuals share pavement space with corny Ken Follett adventures, Charles Dickens vies for public attention with Robert Ludlum. Luck, along with time and inclination, is a prerequisite to a good day’s shopping here. Not finding a book doesn’t necessarily mean it isn’t there. In many cases, the booksellers themselves don’t know if they are sitting ? literally ? upon a rare copy.

“There’s no alternative to a book market like this,” notes Jagdish Yadav, while thumbing through a book at one of the shops. A physician by profession, he has been regularly haunting the bazaar ever since his college days. “I may buy my science manuals from proper bookstores, but this is where I pick up my references for the various other interests I have. From chess to astronomy to science fiction, the bazaar has it all.”

Like all other roadside book markets, this one has a decent stock of pirated books as well. Paolo Coelho and Dan Brown, like everywhere else, top the bestsellers’ list here. Brown’s Da Vinci Code is being lapped up by pretty young things for a humble Rs 50. It’s an occurrence that some people tend to be averse to. “A second-hand book market is a good idea,” says writer Anurag Mathur. “But one has to see that it doesn’t turn into a centre for piracy.”

Agarwal, however, sticks to the dissemination of knowledge as a counter-argument. “What’s wrong with that?” he asks. “We aren’t selling alcohol or narcotics to people here. Is selling books a bigger crime than those?”

The president says he will go the distance to make sure that the battle is won. “We are struggling for survival here, and won’t go down without a fight,” he says. The customers crowding around his stall express sympathy ? Yadav scribbles his support in a scrapbook handed to him by a vendor. Public opinion, it seems, would have a major role to play in the days to come.

Till then, the haggling over books will continue.