Publishing in Pakistan.

I was reading recently in Lucien Febvre's and Henri-Jean Martin's The Coming of the Book (1958) about the early days of printing and the advantages that paper had over parchment, and how in those early days printings were small, a few hundred copies, or for a really big effort, 1,000 copies. And then I reflected that in Pakistan today, printings are often only a few hundred copies, or more confidently, of 1,000 copies. A well-capitalized new publisher, like Alhamra, with lots of new ideas and high tech, will print only 1,000 copies. An established textbook, like Jane Hussein's elementary school text, Illustrated History of Pakistan (OUP) will be printed in an edition of only 1,000 copies. A small publisher in Lahore's Urdu Bazaar, faced with a new novel or work of non-fiction may play it safe and print only half that many.

Such figures say a great deal about not only supply but demand. It the latter were there, more copies would be printed. In the world of educational text book publishing the demand does recur, year after year, and so we get 13 consecutive editions of Jane Hussein's book, each of a thousand, but away from that market, that is not the case.

Overall in the past year in publishing there have been no noteworthy changes. One might note one new sophisticated publisher, Alhamra, in Islamabad. Internal distribution of books in Pakistan is still feeble. Publishing is localized in at least a dozen different cities, which are visited regularly by LoC staff.

Newspapers remain remarkably free, with some interesting exceptions. All exercise self-censorship. There was a recent assault on Frontier Post for publishing a blasphemous piece; its editorial staff are to be tried. There is no Government newspaper, although broadcast media are mainly government monopolies. But outspoken editorial comment, especially in the Friday Times, and Dawn, is not uncommon. The two news monthlies, Newsline and The Herald, continue to be somewhat critical of the government. Investigative journalism is rare, virtually unknown. Many journalists are "for hire". Some of the most rampant abuses in the country, such as trafficking in women, child prostitution and the sexual abuse of children, not to mention bonded labour, go unmentioned in the press.

Monograph publishing. Still characterized by journalists' collected pieces, often with resonant portentous titles. Some of the journalists are retired military officers, a numerous class. Military memoirs also are a productive category. Publications on Quaid-i-Azam continue to appear, most notably vol. V of the Jinnah Papers project.

Oxford University Press continues to be the predominant publisher in the country. As signalled by such recent titles as Sajjad Ali Shah's Law Courts in a Glass House; an Autobiography (2001). This is by a retired chief justice, whose court was attacked in Nov. 1997 by PML bully-boys.

One interesting new publisher, noted above, is Alhamra (www.alhamra.com)

Government publishing, with the exception of the district census reports, showed little activity. Some parliamentary debates were published, about six years late. (Ironic in view of the fact that the parliament has been abolished under the military regime). The Report of the Commission of Enquiry - 1971 War (Hamoodur Rahman Report) was "released" at the beginning of 2001, but not in a form that the public or even journalists could see. Extracts, some quite lengthy appeared in the press, but the Report was bowdlerized even so.

LC Office.

At Islamabad we've added new librarian, who is learning Russian. Our longtime staff member in Karachi has retired; a successor has been selected. Two staff went to the US with SIVs, a third resigned while on leave in the US, a fourth received a green card. Another staffer is hoping for an early SIV. The office, in its small way, thus reflects the great surge of Pakistan immigrants to the US.

In mid-2000, we resumed using IODA, the old system, after the IFOS system proved inadequate. This was very inefficient, as besides the time lost on IFOS, we had then to rekey the IFOS orders into IODA. Productivity was down, acquisitions in some categories were down, cataloging was down. Fortunately FY2001 shows some recovery. Participants were sent a total of 6.254 monographs, 19055 serials and 15,173 newspapers in FY2000. Monograph receipts for LC decline from 1790 in FY1991 to 1591 in FY2000, a decline of 11 %. The current figures for LC are 592 (Pakistan), 767 (Iran) and 102 (Afghanistan), for the first 5 months of 2001, more than doubling of the rate of monographic intake.

Cataloging: in FY2000, 1,644 cataloging records were created, exclusive of NARs and SARs. To the end of February 2001, 951 records have been created, a figure which if extrapolated would be about 2,300 records. Persian 284), Urdu (215), Pushto (182), English (162) and Sindhi (60) were the major languages, with 7 other lagging behind.

Some miscellaneous points:

World Federation of Islamic Missions - ca. 20 pubs.

Maps -Survey of Pakistan, Geological Survey of Pakistan

Posters-Kashmiri Liberation Posters

Bookstores carry remaindered and damaged copies of books brought in from the US.

Thosands of pirated CDROMs

Pitney Bowes

Afghan publications.

The office continue to acquire Afghan publications published during the 1980s and earlier. During the Soviet occupation of that country very little was received. In the current FY, 102 publications have been acquired.

Materials obtained are usually being sent to New Pakistan for microfiching.

Afghan Media Resource Center. This was visited in response to a mooted preservation project for its audio-visual collection.

Iranian publications.

We have an active dealer based in Dubai. We receive Iranian publications from there, direct by mail from Tehran. Publications from Qom, chiefly religious, come to us via Quetta, where we have a representative.

Total number of Iranian books received this FY for LC is 767, including several multivolume works.

James C. Armstrong
16 March 2001

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