A Homecoming in Lal Chowk

When Bestseller reopened in Lal Chowk, it reminded me that endings in Kashmir often carry the promise of a beginning.

- Sadiya Handoo

Bestseller Bookstore has always been a comforting corner of Lal Chowk where time slowed and the world outside softened.

When I first heard it had closed, I felt the weight of something lost. The reasons were familiar: online convenience, dwindling reading habits, and a culture leaning ever more toward screens.

Still, it felt like a personal loss, as if a small pulse of the city had stopped beating. Walking past its shuttered windows, the echo of pages flipping in my memory haunted me.

Then came September, and with it, a whisper of hope: Bestseller was reopening.