Cartons of books littered the floors of the Shri Aurobindo Pathamandir stall, open wires criss-crossed the walls and in the middle of all this Sharma sat helplessly on an upturned crate. “I don’t know if we will be able to make the stall ready by tomorrow. It’s the inauguration today and we haven’t even managed to make racks for the books,” said Sharma.

Sharing Sharma’s helplessness was Ranjit Chaudhury of Bankim Books, though his stall was in a better shape than Shri Aurobindo Pathamandir. It had the racks in place, but Choudhury had other complains. “If we work for the whole night, we might be able to finish the stall by Tuesday evening,” he said.

Those visiting the Book Fair tomorrow or even the day after will be in for a nasty surprise. Skeletons of stalls greet you as you enter Milon Mela, and the monotonous drone of hammer hitting nails act as a background score.

“I have been doing this work for the last 25 years, and every year it’s the same story. Stalls are made at the last moment and we have to work overtime. This year it’s even worse. We haven’t even got electric connection yet,” said Ashok Bhadra, a carpenter working in one of the stalls.

Some like Raju Burman of Rupa & Co were hopeful that things will be better by Tuesday. “Things look pretty bad now, but we will work overtime to ensure,” says Burman.