New Delhi: Celebrity writer Vinod Kumar Shukla went public with a charge in 2022 rarely spoken aloud in the literary world — that his publishers betrayed him. In a video that went viral after actor-writer Manav Kaul posted it on Instagram, the Jnanpith awardee said: “Mujhe dhokha diya gaya hai.” The target of his anger was two of Hindi’s oldest names — Rajkamal Prakashan and Vani Prakashan — accused of hiding sales figures and denying Shukla the royalty he was owed.

Three years on, the story has taken a turn. Shukla recently received a cheque of Rs 30 lakh in Raipur — not from his former publishers, but from Hind Yugm, a decade-old publishing house that thrives on social media buzz and digital marketing. The amount, Hind Yugm claims, is just six months of royalty for Shukla’s nove

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