The 2013 edition of the
Bangalore Comic Con (
@ComicConIndia) was held at the Koramangala Indoor Stadium - the same venue as last year, on June 1 and 2 (today is the last day). Unlike
last year's event, which was the inaugural edition, this second event was perhaps an order of magnitude larger in attendance - it seemed like every school and college student was there. I felt like an outlier in terms of age - till I saw Vinay's photo from the event.
There were more book and comic launches, more speaking events, and just more of everything at this year's event. There were two downsides to this, as expected - the lines were serpentine but fast moving, and the indoor stadium was packed. There was not a place where one could stand without getting jostled around, through no fault of the jostlers or the jostled. Comic Con India's Twitter handle did
reply that next year would see a different venue, but the no entry charge would continue - both good decisions.
Apart from the usual gaggle of fans dressed up as their favorite comic characters, what quite left me thunderstruck was a stall run by
Pyaretoons.com. This is a site run by a comic fan who makes available old, out of print (out of copyright also perhaps?) comics on the net, free of charge it seems. Fans who like his site donate their old comics - mostly the
Indrajal comics that stopped printing in 1990, but also classics like
Chandamama, Nandan,
Champak, and
Diamond Comics - which are then sold off to collectors. The comic you see on the left for instance - The Slave of Mucar - was selling for Rs 400.
A better condition comic, wrapped in a clear plastic cover - like the one below, was selling for Rs 1700. To think I used to buy these comics from the raddiwala at three for a rupee as a student, and had a stash of close to a thousand comics.
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| The Pyaretoons.com stall. |
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| The Pyaretoons.com stall. |
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| Amar Chitra Katha stall. |
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| Amar Chitra Katha stall. |
© 2013, Abhinav Agarwal (अà¤िनव अग्रवाल). All rights reserved.
There were more book and comic launches, more speaking events, and just more of everything at this year's event. There were two downsides to this, as expected - the lines were serpentine but fast moving, and the indoor stadium was packed. There was not a place where one could stand without getting jostled around, through no fault of the jostlers or the jostled. Comic Con India's Twitter handle did reply that next year would see a different venue, but the no entry charge would continue - both good decisions.
Apart from the usual gaggle of fans dressed up as their favorite comic characters, what quite left me thunderstruck was a stall run by Pyaretoons.com. This is a site run by a comic fan who makes available old, out of print (out of copyright also perhaps?) comics on the net, free of charge it seems. Fans who like his site donate their old comics - mostly the Indrajal comics that stopped printing in 1990, but also classics like Chandamama, Nandan, Champak, and Diamond Comics - which are then sold off to collectors. The comic you see on the left for instance - The Slave of Mucar - was selling for Rs 400.
