Dasari Amarendra started reading when he was a child and began writing in 1989. Till date, he has 18 books to his credit and loves interacting with youngsters to instill the reading habit

SRINIVAS REDDY | Hyderabad 

“Please come sir, visit my stall and see my books,” says 72-year-old Dasari Amarendra at the 37th edition of the Hyderabad Book Fair. The retired engineer from Andhra Pradesh is seen inviting one and all with a smile. What is unique about his stall is none of the books, 18 in all are self-published and written by him.   

Dasari Amarendra was born in Dharmajigudem in West Godavari district in 1953 and completed his high school education in Vijayawada. Later, he completed his B.Tech in Electronics in the year of 1974 in Kakinada. Dasari Amarendra worked for 37 years in Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL) in Delhi, Bengaluru and Pune head office.

Dasari Amarendra has the passion of reading books from his childhood, he used to read Chandamama and later he started reading serious literature. Travelling, reading, and writing are the passion of Dasari Amarendra and he started writing books in 1975. He took up writing work in the year of 1989.

Till now, he has written around 18 books, of which 8 books are travelogues, a book on short stories, two literary essays books, two translations and many others. He has visited 12 countries including Australia, Indonesia, Europe, London, Parris and the USA. In India, he has visited the Himalayas many times and he likes to trek there.

Speaking to Metro India, Dasari Amarendra said “My experience with the publishers and booksellers is not encouraging, because they will give the writer only 30 copies for free and we have to pay money to buy our own book from them. So, I have decided not to give my books to any publishers or book sellers.”

“I have my own reader friends and they will purchase my books and we used to sell the Rs 300 books to 200 also, when we see the person not afford to take that and he has interest in reading the book,” he said.

“This is my 7th Book Fair and I have visited Hyderabad, Vijayawada, Delhi and Chandigarh and my main intention is to interact with the readers across the country and encourage the reading habit among the people,” the retired engineer and writer said.