Kolkata and Delhi book fairs started

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The world’s largest book fairs started last week, in Kolkata on Wednesday 27th, and in Delhi on Saturday 30 January, causing authors, publishers, book sellers, journalists and other participants to criss-cross the country after many of them had already attended the Thiruvananthapuram Book Fair in Kerala, the Chennai Book Fair, the Jaipur Literature Festival, or the Mumbai International Book Fair, all of which took place over the past month. Kolkata is said to attract one and a half million bookworms, and the organisers of the New Delhi World Book Fair expect a million visitors.

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• The World Book Fair was inaugurated in New Delhi on 30 January 2010 Photo: IPP

The Kolkata Book Fair, or Boimela or Pustakmela as it is known in Bengali, was inaugurated on Wednesday by West Bengal’s Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and Mexican writer Jorge Luis Volpi Escalante. With 650 book stalls and exhibitors from 15 countries, the organisers of the fair expect it to be at least as much a success as last year’s, when, according to Tridib Chatterjee, Secretary of the Kolkata Publishers and Booksellers Guild, “approximately 1.5 million visitors commuted the fair and total turnover was roughly Rupees 1.7 crores.” Mexico is this year’s Guest of Honour. One of the first events at the fair, Shabana Azmi’s presentation of her mother’s memoirs, drew as large an audience as readings from the book she held in New Delhi and Jaipur earlier this year.

The New Delhi World Book Fair opened last Saturday at Pragati Maidan, occupying 10 of its halls and a couple of large tents. It was inaugurated by Union Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal with the release of an International Rights Catalogue. Historian Professor Irfan Habib and NBT Chairman Professor Bipin Chandra appealed to the Minister to have the book fair change its bi-annual format to an annual event. In view of the upcoming Commonwealth games, the fair’s major feature this year is “Reading Our Common Wealth”, supported by an exhibition and rights catalogue of books on sports and NBT’s National Action Plan for Readership Development among the Youth”. Other attractions are a dedicated Children’s Pavilion and an exhibition of books on and by Jawaharlal Nehru. The fair, spread over an area of 42,000 square metres, has 1,200 exhibitors including 35 foreign exhibitors from 15 countries.

Both the Kolkata Book Fair and the New Delhi World Book Fair will last until Sunday 7 February.

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