Days after publishing house Bloomsbury de-platformed the ‘Delhi Riots 2020: The Untold Story’ book and Garuda Prakashan went ahead with the publication, the book has crossed a whopping 30,000 preorders.
Taking to Twitter, BJP leader Kapil Mishra tweeted, “30,000 copies already booked… I pledge I will buy 100 copies of Delhi Riots’ Untold Story.” He added that he would distribute the books to people. Mishra then set an ambitious target of 50,000 pre-orders and urged people to make the target possible. “Let us make a record of 50,000 bookings”, he reiterated.
30,000 copies already Booked
— Kapil Mishra (@KapilMishra_IND) August 30, 2020
I pledge , I will buy 100 copies of #DelhiRiotsUntoldStory Book and distribute it
मैं इस किताब की 100 कॉपी खरीद कर लोगों को पढ़ने को दूंगा
आइये हम सब मिलकर 50,000 बुकिंग का रिकॉर्ड बनायें
50,000 किताब – करारा जवाब
#50000KitabKararaJawab
The book, which is a factual account based on investigation and interviews conducted by the authors, was scheduled to be published by Bloomsbury in September. 100 copies of the book were printed and handed over to the authors, and it was available for pre-order on Amazon. However, following the outrage by Islamists and left-liberal jamaat on social media, Bloomsbury issued a statement announcing the withdrawal of the book. The book authored by Monika Arora, Sonali Chitalkar and Prerna Malhotra was abruptly withdrawn by the publishing house on 22nd August under pressure from UK Office even as the authors were attending a virtual launch of the book. Later, co-author Monika Arora informed that they have decided to publish the book through Garuda Prakashan. Now the book is being published in Hindi too.
The backslash from the Islamists came as a blessing in disguise for the book, as people from the right-wing rushed to place orders for the book just after it was announced that Garuda Prakashan will publish it. Due to overwhelming demand, the server of the publication house had crashed, and publishers had to make alternate arrangements for receiving orders. Within less than an hour of the book was open for pre-booking, it had sold over 10,000 copies.
Soon after the book shifted hands from Bloomsbury to Garuda, a PDF copy of the manuscript of the book had emerged on social media. The copy mentioned Bloomsbury as the publisher of the book, after which it was alleged that Bloomsbury had released the manuscript that was available with them to harm the same of the sale of Garuda Prakashan’s book. This allegation holds weight as the manuscript is available only with the authors and the publication house before its release, and authors will not release it as it may harm the sale of the book after it is published.
