Mathura, in Uttar Pradesh, with an area of 3,800 square kilometres and a population of 300,000, is strategically located 145 km southeast of Delhi and 58 km northwest of Agra. With arterial road and train routes running through the city, a large and recently built oil refinery, and flourishing silver polishing and textile printing industries, Mathura is a major centre for textbook printing in India, writes Dhawal Kumar.

Although some current news reports imply that 260 million students attend schools from class 1 to 12 throughout the country, we believe that the actual number of students enrolled in government schools cannot exceed 225 million (22.5 crore) taking into account the high dropout percentages and is more likely something like 170 million. It is reported that 62 per cent of primary school children drop out by class 10. Nevertheless, the printing of school textbooks is a huge industry dominated by the books prescribed by the 35 state government education departments.

School textbooks in India
Each year, tenders are invited by the various State Council(s) of Education Research and Training (SCERT) in association with their state examination boards from an approved list of printers. The printers whom we met in Mathura told us that the only established printers bid for tenders and accept the challenge because there is considerable red tape. In spite of numerous challenges at the production stage of every book, the printers of Mathura seem to be thriving. Of the approximately 140 million books required by the UP State Education Board, the book printers of Mathura provide as many as 56 million books. In addition they also print books for other state governments and for private publishers.

K.C. Printing, Oyster, and Laxmi
Mahesh Chand Agrawal, proprietor of K.C. Printing and Allied Works, is one of the most experienced Mathura printers. “We print school text books for various state education boards, such as Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. We also print the answer books for the various examination boards. As a government recognised printing press, our USP has been to provide good quality work at a low price and because of this the printers in Mathura are able to survive.”

Showing us samples of printed books, Mr Agrawal described the process for printing school textbooks, “There is a tender every year floated by the various education boards. Printers take part in the tender and the government sets some guidelines for the printers.”

For executing the orders, he says, “We have four web offset machines from Perfect Rotary, eight paper cutting machines, twenty book stitching machines and five bundling machines. . . “various education boards give us the paper, but for some states like Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand we have to buy our own paper. We have distributors for inks, plates and other things based in Mathura and Agra from whom we get the supplies. For plates we rely wholly on Technova and for inks we go for Micro Inks (Hubergroup) and Coates (DIC).”

Talking about the Mathura printing industry Mr. Agrawal says, “In the city there are more than 20 major printers. Some time back a government policy was floated that prohibits polluting units in a 65-kilometre circumference around the Taj Mahal. Our press also falls under this area, but we have taken steps to avoid pollution beyond the said limits.”

He added, “Electricity is a major problem for us. In view of this we have set up our own in-house power plant, for full backup but the spiralling prices of petrol and diesel make this costlier now. This is also adding to our input costs.”

Oyster Printers
We also met Banwari Lal Agrawal of Oyster Printers and Publishers another local printer specialising in school textbooks from class one to eight. According to him, “Mathura has a big role in the printing of school books in North India. More than 40 per cent of the work is given to printers based here, and the other 60 per cent goes to other cities and towns in Uttar Pradesh.” Oysters prints more than one crore (10 million) textbooks in every printing season. Located in Mathura Industrial Area, it uses four web offset presses, two from Perfect Rotary, one from The Printers’ House and one from Ideal Printographics. They also have an imported guillotine and a perfect binding machine.

“Every year there is a tender and most of the winners are from Mathura because they are able to give good quality at a competitive price. Being connected with good roads and railway network we have good advantage over printers from other similar cities.”

Working for the bureaucracy has its pitfalls. Says Mr. BL Agrawal, “As we do jobs for the government there is lot of delay in getting our payments since there are various approval stages. I think the government should take some remedial measures for this, so that we don’t get harassed due to bureaucratic steps.”

Laxmi Printing Press
The 160 year-old Laxmi Printing Press is a commercial printer well known for having been visited by Mahatma Gandhi and Subhas Chandra Bose. Started by Lala Hiralal and formerly known as “Hira Lal Shyam Kashi Chhapakhana” it is currently run by his grandson Girdhari Agrawal. Laxmi has several units in Mathura and also in Mumbai and Bangalore. It also has its own publishing house, Arth Books.

Laxmi has two Solna 4-colour sheetfed presses, one Akiyama Hi-Ace 4-colour sheetfed press and two Planeta Super Variant 5-colours of which one has an inline coater. About the printing industry Girdhari Agrawal says, “The industry is currently under pressure with a price rise of 20 per cent in inks and 25 per cent in chemicals. But inspite of these challenges we are running our presses to full capacity and serving the needs of our customers in Mathura.”