At Rs 21.2 crore, book fair sales jump by 15% this year

KOLKATA: The last day of the International Kolkata

Book Fair

seemed to have lost the sting of the weekend. While Saturday and Sunday saw the fair bursting

at

the seams and publishers and booksellers happily converting footfall into cash, Monday’s affair was definitely low-key.


However, all’s well that ends well and if numbers have the capacity to tell the gist of a story, then this year’s book fair has done 15% better in terms of sales, according to records of the Publishers and Booksellers Guild, the organizing body.

This year, the sales saw a surge despite the fair being shorter by a day. Usually, the fair is a 13-day affair that has now become part Kolkata’s annual calendar.

A total sale of

Rs 21.2 crore

was registered by the guild till reports came in on Monday evening before the fair closed. This year’s sales figure was over Rs 1 crore more than last year. Till Monday evening, the total footfall stood at 23 lakh, which was again a lakh more than last year.

Curtains came down on the annual book browsing, buying and selling affair at 9pm on Monday with the symbolic ringing of the bell. However, this was the first time the guild failed to announce

the dates of next year’s fair. Usually, the dates are announced at the time of closing. While one of the reasons could be the expectation that Milan Mela renovation would be done by January next year, in time for the fair, the other reason might be that the choice of the focal theme country often forced guild to negotiate dates after announcement.

“This time, Guatemala could not make itself present at the previously announced date and we had to delay the fair by a day. Next year, Russia is the theme country and we do not want to take a chance with the public announcement of dates before finalising them with Russia. However, it will definitely be towards the end of January like every year,” said Tridib Chatterjee, general secretary of the guild.

As far as the venue is concerned, the authorities said that initially it was thought the shift from Milan Mela would cost the fair dear.

“Now we see that we have adjusted to it. If we go back to Milan Mela, it would be good, but even otherwise we can adjust quite well, we have seen that. A lot depends upon the state government…” Chatterjee added. This sentiment was echoed by Indo-Anglian writer, Saikat Majumdar, who teaches creative writing at Ashoka University and was in the city only for the fair.

“Take the book fair anywhere and readers will reach it…it’s a rare fair and so is the spirit of readers here…” he said.