Tucked into Meher House on Cawasji Patel Street in Fort, near Akbar Ali Departmental Store, People’s Book House is easy to miss. Surrounded by stationery shops and photocopy stores, it sits quietly, its presence marked more by memory than display. Inside, there are no curated sections or spotlight shelves — just tightly packed rows of books stacked across walls and tables, arranged more by familiarity than design.
What the store holds is less urgency and more a sense of a reading culture that once thrived on discussion, ideology and exchange, and now lingers in fragments.
Established in 1973 under the aegis of Lokvangmay Griha, the bookstore was part of a larger effort to make political and social literature accessible. Its roots trace back to the Communist Party of India’s publishing initiatives in the 1950s, but this modest Fort outlet grew into something more: a meeting ground.
“There was a time when people didn’t just come to buy books,” said Gopal Pujari, who has managed the store since 1992. “They came to sit, talk, discuss literature, politics, everything.”
Through the 1970s and 1980s, its shelves were filled with subsidised Soviet publications and translations of writers like Fyodor Dostoevsky and Leo Tolstoy, alongside political pamphlets and theory. Students, trade unionists, activists, journalists and writers gathered here, and conversations often spilled beyond the books themselves.
The shift began in the early 1990s. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the steady supply of Russian books stopped. “After 1992, everything changed,” Pujari said. “When those books stopped coming, we had to start with local publications.”
The store adapted, turning to Indian languages and regional publishers. Today, its collection leans towards Marathi, Hindi and English works on social and political thought, Dalit literature and progressive writing. Munshi Premchand sits alongside works on B.R. Ambedkar and contemporary critical theory. “We started keeping local books… from Mumbai, Pune, Kolhapur — wherever we could get them,” Pujari said.
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The space once hosted regular poetry readings, music and discussions. “Every Saturday, there used to be programmes — poetry, music, talks. Around 20 to 25 people would come. Now, that doesn’t happen,” he recalled.
Among its visitors were literary figures such as Marathi poet Arun Kolatkar, Hindi novelist and playwright Bhisham Sahni, Marathi novelist and critic Balchandra Nemade and poet and translator Dilip Chitre, who read and engaged with audiences in intimate settings. Musicians like Neela Bhagwat also performed here, blurring the boundaries between literature and performance. Journalists, too, frequented the store, reflecting its role as a hub for ideas beyond the purely literary.
Today, there are fewer visitors. The store sees about 10 to 15 customers on an average day. A worn counter still holds paper registers. “Earlier it used to be 25, 30, even 50 people. We didn’t get time to eat. Now that situation is not there,” he said.
Younger readers, Pujari notes, rarely walk in, often gravitating towards self-help and lifestyle books. There is no bitterness in his voice, only a quiet acknowledgement of change.
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Even the space reflects this shift. Shelves have multiplied, leaving little room to sit or linger. Where conversations once unfolded, transactions now dominate.
And yet, the bookstore persists.
Unlike larger retail chains such as Crossword, People’s Book House continues to stock titles that are difficult to find elsewhere — works that challenge, provoke or exist outside mainstream demand. Its pricing remains modest, its curation deliberate. “We try to give people something different,” Pujari said.
Even as the store is no longer the bustling hub it once was, it stands as a quieter presence — less a meeting place, more an archive of a certain intellectual culture.
