‘It was more insanity than courage’: Arpita Das on what made her start Yoda Press twenty years ago

Arpita Das was 30 when she founded Yoda Press with Parul Nayyar. A career in trade publishing had started to feel restricting and this seemed to be the next – and the right – thing to do. In the initial days, the “office” was a friend’s grandmother’s terrace flat, and the logo was designed by another friend. Soon, Yoda Press started to publish “edgy” writings, which Das says has evolved with the times by keeping their ears to the “ground”. It was important for the list to not be static, lest the big publishers caught on to it and moved in quickly to capture ground.

In the two decades since its inception, Das and her team have published books on queerness- and gender-related themes, the Covid-19 pandemic, citizen’s rights, and other pressing issues. They have also championed fiction in English and in translation. Their graphic narratives have always sold well and readers are hungry for more. Still, publishing is a difficult business and the fight to survive is constant and difficult – expenses must not pile up, the lists must be carefully curated, and, most important, authors must feel cherished for their work. Over the years, Das has worked had to strike the right...

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