Cheap Books, A Peaceful Reading Room And More At This Bandra Library

The Maharashtra Mitra Mandal’s library, also fondly known as the Mcubed Library, is a peaceful haven nestled near Dmonte Park next to the Bandra Gymkhana.

Mcubed library was set up as a people’s initiative in 1981 to provide a space for the community to come together, read and have access to a wide range of books, magazines, journals and more. Their main aim is to ‘nurture the cultural heritage of Maharashtra’ which it is by curating a variety of books from fiction, non-fiction, academic texts to biographies and more. They even have a great collection of Marathi literature, so if you’d like to brush up your Marathi, you know where to begin with.

They have two sections, one for the kids and for the adults. Both equally colourful and well stocked, they also offer spacious and surprisingly sunny and really well done up reading rooms where we perched ourselves to read a copy of Zadie Smith’s ‘White Teeth‘.

When we entered the library {after removing our shoes} we were staring at a placard of ‘Books on Sale for INR 20}. That’s right, the library has a table out in the front, opposite to the reception with second-hand books up for grabs only for INR 20 each. From Alice Walker’s heart-wrenching and beautiful ‘The Colour Purple‘ to Dan Brown’s ‘The Da Vinci Code’, a couple of Paulo Coelho among other genres were stacked symmetrically on the table. Fancy owning an old copy of Harry Potter and The Order Of Pheonix? It’s waiting for you there, rather patiently.

We proceeded to browse through the shelves next to the entrance and discovered a whole rack of old magazines lying neatly in a bundle: The New York Review, The New Yorker, Lonely Planet, Outlook Traveller, Good Food, National Geographic. Though they were old editions, one is free to borrow them anytime and soak up the marvelous writing from their features.

They offer two types of annual membership, one is the Galaxy one which includes four books plus 1 magazine at a time borrowing for INR 2,200 with a refundable deposit of IR 1,000}. The Sun membership includes two books plus one magazine for INR 1,700 out of which INR 500 is the refundable deposit.

However, if you do not like the yearly commitment, one can also opt for the Moon membership which is a six-monthly membership for INR 850, which lets you borrow one book and one magazine at a time {INR 250 is refundable}. The Reading Room can be availed as well for INR 200 per month, so that you can go and sit there as long as you want, isolated and in concentration. All of the books can be borrowed for two weeks, post which you need to either renew it or give it back.

Get yourself an easy membership at the Mcubed so that the next time you want some quiet and peace in Bandra, you can curl yourself up in a corner at the Library and read away.

#LBBTip: They also accept book donations all year round, however, do make an appointment with them prior to walking in with your books. If they already have a good stock of the book you want to donate, they will get you in touch with other places that will accept your generous donation.