Book haven in Shershah's warehouse.

KARACHI -- There was a time when Karachi had a decent number of bookstores. Then the number shrank. Some bright minds feel it's because Pakistani society is increasingly becoming a de-intellectualised one. Even if one doesn't go along with this notion, the fact is that these days there aren't many bookshops in Karachi compared to, let's say, up until the late 1980s or early 1990s. It does not augur well. The argument that the digital world is taking over does not hold water because in the West where the digital medium is more extensively used than in our region, the culture of reading newspapers and books, especially the publication of books, hasn't dwindled.

But then, as Ernest Hemmingway writes in The Old Man and the Sea, 'It's silly not to hope.' Recently, a few images on social media of a sizable quantity of books neatly stacked in a large enclosed space attracted attention of some inquisitive individuals. It turned out that the pictures were of a warehouse in Shershah. It looked like a haven for books. Well, it is.

The warehouse is run by a man named Mansoor Mohammad Siddique, who had a shop in the famous Khori Garden area once known for its formidable market from where students and general readers could buy a range of stationery, magazines and books at relatively cheaper prices. As things panned out and the reading habit declined - at least that's the impression - those who sold those publications closed shop. Mansoor was one of them.

'Khori Garden was a decades-old market but today there's a cosmetics' bazaar there. Here [at Shershah] we deal in wholesale. Now retail customers can't approach us or we can't...