Shimla, Aug 20 - Curiosity equals book sales. That equation seems to be at work here with copies of Jaswant Singh's 'Jinnah: India - Partition - Independence' flying off shelves as people dig into their pockets to find out why the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader expelled its veteran leader.

The queues started soon after the party president Rajnath Singh, who is here with top leaders of the party for a three-day introspection session, announced the expulsion Wednesday morning.

'Yesterday, I issued a statement about the BJP dissociating itself from Jaswant Singh's views. The party discussed the matter at the chintan baithak and it was decided to expel him,' Rajnath Singh announced, two days after the book's release in New Delhi that was boycotted by the party.

With that, book sales soared.

'Jaswant Singh's book is selling like hot cakes in Shimla. I sold more than 20 books on a single day (Wednesday),' said Rajender Aggarwal of Minerva Book Depot, a book store on The Mall.

'I have never seen such a response to any author in about 30 years of being in the book selling business,' he said.

Ashok Kumar Kinger of Asia Book Depot received his first consignment Tuesday and has already ordered for more stocks.

'We received 10 books from a distributor Tuesday. So far, we have already sold six books. As the demand is increasing, we have ordered additional stocks.