HISTORY OF A BOOK: “TREK THE SAHYADRIS”

 Sometimes a local Mumbai tabloid sends a  young reporter to interview me about trekking. She has two questions:  “When did you start trekking?” And my reply – “about 60 year ago”  baffles her- almost unbelievable look in her eyes tell me that. The second question is :”How did you start trekking?”  My reply was that I started enjoying the hills in range near Mumbai, the Sahyadris. With bewildered look she asks that fatal question: “are there hills near Mumbai?”  The interview ends there and I asked her to return after travelling Mumbai to Pune and viewing  the hills.

She was one up on me.  She returned the same week .”I know all about it, I have purchased the book “Trek the Sahyadris”.  This book was written by me and the first edition was published in 1977.

I used to trek from 1960s and luckily as a habit from school days, maintained a diary of treks. In those days when trekking was  undertaken by only a few these notes proved a treasure trove of information. I produced some typed sheets of information as few people kept asking me details to go trekking.

Once in early morning in a local train towards Matheran, we were chatting when a I grumbled that now too many people are asking for details  and I have to post it to them regularly.  Dr Rodhan Shroff, seating opposite me, gave a suggestion, “Why don’t you write  a book and publish it.” The idea had its root there and soon I was arranging details, drawing maps and sorting photographs.  Area maps were put in a folder towards end of the book.  It was  published privately and offered for sale at one of the trekkers gathering.   Almost same week 500 copies (total print run) was sold out!  It was priced at Rs 7 per copy

Encouraged with this I planned  to publish the second edition within a year. By this time, we had formed a Club named “The Mountaineers”,  which lasted for 37 years. The next edition was published under this banner and printed by Mouj Printers.  Much new information was added as my trekking was continuing in full force- almost 40 hikes a year.  Noticing  these two editions of Trek The Sahyadris, Jagdish Nanavati approached me to become an Editor of the Himalayan Journal, as the current  editor  Soli Mehta was going abroad. I was joined by leading editor of that time, R.E. Hawkins. This was major influence and made a  qualitative change in my life editing and  publishing. And again, it was for 37 years that  I remained editor of the Himalayan Journal.

I was in contact with Prof R.G.Desai, who worked at Sophia College, quite near my house. He was good at cartography and loved the range. The maps in the second edition were   hand-drawn by him. He had read a lot about the Sahyadri as  few literature that available was in Marathi language, in which I was not very proficient, though married to a Maharashtrian!   

The Second Edition had  larger print run and so it took  couple of years to be sold out completely.  I used to store them with me and most of the time had to post copies to persons  demanding it. Few bookstores at Girgaum, Dadar and some in Pune started stocking it.

One of the main reasons of its popularity was non-availability of information on trekking. But in the text, I had specifically avoiding giving more details  than required for trekker to find its way. This allowed for a sense of discovery for a trekker and that was liked by readers, Getting lost sometimes in  the mountains was as much fun and challenging as reaching a peak. 

I was trekking with vigour and with two friends specially,  Vijay Kothari (well known as Paka), Dr Praviin Shah (known as Masiha) and my wife Geeta  would join us.   During those days trekking was an activity organised by Clubs, colleges and larger groups. Sometime group as large as 50 persons went for a trek to same routine places. This stifled us and so we started going on treks privately, not more than 4 to 6 persons. We called “PHM” (“Private Hiking Movement” – after “Paka–Harish-Masiha”). We were liberated, studied maps and planned treks systematically to different regions. Moreover, some historical books were studied to collect brief information about how these forts have played a part in the Maratha history.

With this I was ready for the  Third Edition of the book as last edition was over.  Anand Limaye  of India Printing Press offered to print the third edition which we released on top of Tikona Fort, Limaye  joining us to the top as his first hike! But now marketing and distribution was in his hand and I was there in a capacity as an  author. In the third edition maps were now drawn with scale by Arun Samant, a friend who was an architect. The  accuracy of maps  increased a lot.  As usual more forts, hills and now lakes and new roads being constructed  were added in the book.

Then came the next phase for Trek The Sahyadris.  Indus Books, a publisher from Delhi was publishing several of my Himalayan books with success. They took over  the publication of Trek The Sahyadris.  As they were based at Delhi and had no knowledge of the range, I had to keep a keen eye on the publication and help them to market it. The book did very well as the territories for sale  were expanded. Trekkers in Goa, interior Maharashtra, Bangalore and Karnataka were exposed to it and it went to libraries in many parts of the country. Fourth and Fifth editions were published soon after each other as changes in technology allowed smaller print runs and better production. There were several Reprints of the 5^th edition.  Major change, apart from additional information as always, was that now maps were drawn to an exact scale of 1:250,000 on computer by Aparna Joshi. She had been doing maps for the Himalayan Journal for a while and was an expert at it. She took keen interest and with cross-reference to  maps of the same scale were maps, that can be used on treks even.

After a decade and half of this happy state of events, unfortunately, Indus Books wound up and the book was without a publisher. Some websites copied information unauthorised and plagiarism of this book was rampant.  This went on for  almost a decade. But still I was getting regular phone calls, e-mails about availability of this book. I was busy with writing my Himalayan book.  But even with advent of Digital world there was a demand for paper copy of this book.

“Sahyadris Books” an online store in Pune, used to buy copies from the Indus till they close shop. They contacted me  to purchase  few copies of the book  that were available with me. Thus, we both parties came to know each other.  When  I was in Pune to deliver a lecture. Manoj Kelkar of the Sahyadri Books approached me with several of their Marathi publications as sample. Soon we finalised about “Trek The Sahyadris”  6^th Edition. Rest as they say in history.

This vastly revised edition with new set of maps, colour photos and rearranged text was published in 2019. The book was made very trekker friendly with easy references.   Trek The Sahyadris book has lasted almost two generations (in print for 45 years, in 2022)  and   it is gratifying to meet old trekkers who  say that this book was their beginning!