December 2007 Edition
Vidya Viswanathan
New Delhi
TILL a few years ago, children in India had very few nice books to read. Mostly, middle class children made do with books from overseas. But over the last decade, things are changing. There are now three or four publishers dedicated to bringing out books for children of all age groups. Their titles are beautifully illustrated, wellresearched, well-written and produced on good paper. The Chennai-based Tulika Books is one of them. The company, whose staff strength is all of ten people with three editors, publishes at least 17 titles every year for children. They bring out picture books, bi-lingual books, fiction for older children, non-fiction and teacher resource books. Their books are illustrated with Indian art. For instance, Putul and the Dolphins, a book about a girl who lives on the banks of the Ganges in Bengal is illustrated in the Bengal style of art. Tulika tries to bring out the diversity of India. Most stories are about contemporary India. There is a book about a girl who grew up on an archeological excavation site in Tamil Nadu where her grandfather is one of the workmen helping the archeologists.
A history book called The Forbidden Temple is a collection of stories about children who lived in different periods in India. There is a picture book about the games that children play. It is titled Gada gada gudu gudu which is an expression used in Tamil. The book also shows street games like marbles, gilli danda and kites. Civil Society spoke to Radhika Menon, who started Tulika Books in Chennai about their work
Why did you get into children’s publishing?
I was teaching at the Krishnamurthy Foundation School in Chennai and that is where my interest in education and children’s books began. At that school, you had to create your own syllabus and teaching methods. I found there was a lack of good books on India and Indian themes. The experienced teachers had a fund of stories and songs. But I always had trouble facing the class. I could find a lot of books on the Amazon if I wanted but closer home…there was very little material. There were garishly coloured comics. The Children’s Book Trust’s books are beautifully illustrated but the stories are too simple. Their non-fiction books are crammed with text and facts. Some of my colleagues at the school had their own children’s collection which they had brought from overseas and when I read those I was excited by the possibilities.
How did you begin publishing?
In 1987-88, my sister-in-law, Indira Chandrashekaran, who had a publishing background, and I decided to start something. So we began by doing pre-press work on Apple Macs for Rupa, Penguin and other publishers. That was the start of Tulika Communications and that is where we learnt the ropes of the business. She went on to publish academic books on social sciences at Tulika, Delhi. I started Tulika for children’s publishing in Chennai in 1996 when Sandhya Rao, one of our editors joined us after quitting her job at Frontline magazine.
How do you decide what will work and what won’t?
We want a range of books for children up to 15 years of age. We go by our judgment and often against conventional wisdom. For example our “Under the Banyan Tree” series which we did with Karadi Books are very wordy. Sometimes we know some books won’t be popular but we still go ahead. Suresh and the Sea (about a boy from the fishing community after the tsunami), Heena in the Old City (A girl who lives in old Delhi) and Aiyyapan and the Magic Horse (A boy from the folk performing community) are examples. We will do history, geography, sociology, science and the works for children. There is also a process of education and the teachers own exposure. About 30 percent of our books are risky and may not move but the other 70 will be bought if seen. The same schools which did not respond earlier buy our books for their library. Soon our titles should move into classrooms.
How do you choose authors and topics?
We look for like-minded people who love publishing. We are just ten people and three editors. We outsource all our printing. The books on rivers were done by Priya Krishnan a publishing assistant who works with us part time. Nina Sabnani was a professor of animation at the National Institute of Design. She had made animation films titled The Story of Nothing and Mukand and Riaz; we got her to do books based on those films. We knew that Zai Whitaker had worked with the Irula tribe and so we got her to write the story of Kali, an Irula boy who goes to school. Sometimes authors bring in their own books. We are also very careful about visualisation. Not many illustrators can visualise. Sometimes we suggest the style and at other times we layout the entire page. Visualisation makes the ordinary, uncommon.The book, What shall I make? is about how the chapati dough morphs. What makes the book interesting is the way it is broken up.
How are your bi- lingual books doing?
We were very clear that you have to learn your own language and we published Line and Circle in English and Tamil. Using books with two languages in classrooms was unheard of 10 years ago and teachers wanted us to take off Tamil. But we continued publishing in Hindi and English. We started doing Marathi and Gujarati because an NGO wanted it. Now we publish bi-lingual booksin eight Indian languages. It has started paying off because rural libraries are coming up. Delhi-based Room to Read, Bangalore-based Akshara and Pratham are setting them up. There are also smaller groups doing it. But marketing is still a struggle. We have to give our distributors 40 to 50 per cent margins. We pass that on to the NGO. We recover our cost and a little more on these books.
Are you profitable?
It is still difficult hanging in. We almost closed down three years ago and then we used to publish only when we got a sponsorship or a grant. Now we can plan for about 20 titles a year. We have done 15 in 2007. But out of these, ten are in eight languages and so that is 180 new books. We still can’t sit back and say we will do so much of retail and so much through schools like the big publishers do. We have to push all three channels – retail, schools and NGOs. We do about Rs 1.5 crores a year but cash flow is still a problem. We don’t let go of any title. We print all.
What are your future plans?
We will publish different kinds of books and more importantly create a market for those books. All kinds of schools should use them. These books bridge the gap between the rich and poor. If a child reads a book in English and the same book is read in Telugu by another child, they are sharing an experience and that makes it meaningful.
When you say create a market what do you mean?
Wherever our books are visible, they sell. But we are now starting an independent publisher’s network. A combined catalogue will create strength in numbers. Instead of 30 or 40 titles, we will now have a thousand titles. The network includes Tulika Delhi, Left Word, Three Essays, Women Unlimited, Stree and Navayana.
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