By Azera Rahman and bureau reports, IANS
New Delhi : Potter fans queuing up at five in the morning, bookshops opening at six, early morning breakfast parties…the Potter phenomenon has gripped India – like elsewhere in the world – with the release of the seventh and possibly last edition in the series by J.K. Rowling.
Oxford Bookstore, one of the popular bookstores in the capital, opened its doors to excited muggles (human beings in Potter lingo) to lay their hands on "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows", the seventh edition of the series.
"We opened our store at six but people had started queuing up since five. And by people we don't just mean children. There were many teenagers and adults as well," Nitin Chaterjee, store manager of Oxford, told IANS.
"We sold more than 150 books in two hours and expect another 500 to fly off the shelves by the end of the day. No other book has ever received such a phenomenal response as this one," he added.
Engrossed in the magical world built up in the pages of the thick book, 12- year-old Shreya Ghosh was one of the many who simply propped herself on one of the cushions at Oxford after buying it.
"I have already reached the fourth chapter," said Ghosh, the fast reader that she is. "I don't want to know the end from anyone else, hence I want to finish reading it before anybody else kills the suspense on which two characters will die in this book," she said.
Teksons, a bookstore in the capital that opened a tad bit later, at seven in the morning, sold 50 books in the first hour. "Almost all the buyers had pre-booked the book for fear that we would run out of stock! They also got a discount of 20 percent on pre-booking. We have already opened four cartons till now," Sumit Soni, the store manager, said.
What's more, many stores organised special Potter parties, fancy dress competitions and games to suit the fancy of the hungry Potter fan.
Oxford, for instance, threw a special Hogwarts (Harry's school's name) carnival that had a fancy dress competition, games typical to the Potter world- Quidditch match for instance, and a grand feast later.
In Bangalore, bookstores offered cookies for famished fans who were in the queue since morning and screened all the Potter movies in their stores throughout the day.
Landmark, another major bookshop in the city, turned the store into a castle to go with the mood of the Pottermania.
In Uttar Pradesh, despite being in the Hindi heartland, the craze was as overwhelming as anywhere else.
"It was a long wait, I could hardly sleep through the night waiting for the new dawn – a dawn with the new Harry Potter on the stands", 18-year-old Prabhakar Seth told IANS outside Lucknow's famous Universal Booksellers in Hazratganj.
"It has been the biggest rage ever. The last Potter series was also a big draw but this one has beaten all past records," said Chander Prakash, the owner of Universal Booksellers.
"I reached my shop at 4.25 a.m. and two boys were already waiting outside. It's just mind boggling," he added.
In Jharkhand, it was a similar scenario. In Ranchi, while most grabbed the first lot of the seventh edition of the book, there were others who are awaiting the Hindi version of the book.
"I cannot read English and am anxiously waiting for the Hindi version of the last three books of the series," said Manoj Kumar, a Class 12 student. Except the fifth, sixth and the last edition, the rest of the series has been translated into Hindi as well.
Some bookstores also organised magic shows, calligraphy writing competition and games. Schools in the capital like Springdales and Vasant Valley planned discussions on Harry Potter after the book released Saturday.
K.P.R. Nair of Konark Publishers said that other than Potter there was just one other book in the past that had seen people queuing up outside bookstores since six in the morning.
"It was B.M. Kaul's book on the China war in 1962. That book brought out our inability to do anything in that grim situation and was lapped up by the public," Nair told IANS.
Having bought six books at the break of dawn for his 26-year-old daughter, family and friends, Nair said the Harry Potter book has the perfect flavour of drama which not only attracts the young but also the old.
For the staff of Penguin India, the publishing house which represents the book in the country, the excitement to the 'P' (Potter) day started the night before with many staying back in office and feeding voraciously on Potter books and movies.
"No other book has got such a phenomenal response. It's a glorious moment in the publishing history," said Thomas Abraham, CEO of Penguin India.
"We stayed back the night in the office just for the thrill of it," said Hemali Sodhi, spokesperson of Penguin India to IANS.
"For the sixth book of the Harry Potter series last year we received bookings for 160,000 copies. But this time the bookings from the bookstores – which is dependent on the demand for the book – crossed the 250,000 mark," Sodhi said.
And with Harry, the young hero of the book, surviving at the end, expectations are sure re-born of yet another saga by Rowling.