Crossword’s Nidhi Gupta on why reading will never die

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Crossword’s physical stores remain at the heart of the business | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement

Nidhi Gupta, the executive director of Crossword, remains remarkably optimistic about the future of books and bookstores, despite the spectre of AI looming over the industry. “I believe people continue to crave a personal point of view, and a book meets that need in a way few other formats can.”

This craving, Nidhi believes, comes from the intrinsic value we bestow on an original human voice. “When it comes to books, I think readers will continue to value the originality and perspective of a human voice,” believes Nidhi, an avid reader herself. “I don’t think books are going anywhere. There will always be readers.”

It is why the bookstore chain, which has just opened its 133rd outlet in the country at Powai, Mumbai, continues to champion Indian literature with the annual Crossword Book Awards. Now in its 20th year, the brand recently announced its jury for this edition, which includes Manju Kapur, Samit Basu, Naresh Fernandes, Shrayana Bhattacharya, Meena Kandasamy and Ranjit Hoskote, among others.

“We are really excited about celebrating the 20th edition of the Crossword Book Awards,” says the Pune-based Nidhi. As one of India’s leading bookstore chains, she says, “we believe we have the responsibility to help more people discover and recognise exceptional Indian writing.”

Nidhi Gupta, the executive director of Crossword, continues to be optimistic about books | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement

According to her, what started as a single award has expanded into 10 categories across multiple genres, divided into jury awards and popular awards. “As Indian publishing has grown across genres, the Awards have evolved with it. It is difficult to put very different kinds of writing under one definition of the best book or most popular book, so expanding the categories allowed us to recognise a much wider range of work,” she says. And while no awards framework can represent every genre, she feels that “there is a enormous amount of creative work that should be celebrated and talked about,” in the existing categories, which include fiction, non-fiction, business and management, children’s literature and translation.

Over the last two decades, over 100 books have received this award, with several eminent writers, such as Ruskin Bond (2016), Sudha Murty (2017), Shashi Tharoor (2018), Amitav Ghosh (2024), and Shanta Gokhale (2025), also being conferred with the Lifetime Achievement Award.

“Popular books naturally receive attention, but there is an enormous amount of excellent writing that readers may simply not encounter; the Crossword award brings that to the forefront,” says Nidhi.