I was finally able to solve this problem by using the PhoneGap NFC plugin. I extracted the payload from the tag read using the 1st command shown below and then converted the bytes received into a string, again by also using a method made available via the plug-in. Hope this helps someone starting off with NFC and plugin.
some_value = nfcEvent.tag.ndefMessage[0]["payload"];
string_value = nfc.bytesToString(some_value);
Thanks!